Fire In The Skies
by seventhranger
Summary: A sneak peek into the Belkan War through the eyes of an ace. How two unlikely friends bonded like brothers, and how a war tore apart millions of lives. (slightly AU) (warnings for swearing, violence, and character death)
1. p r o l o g u e

_I was flying… I was in my usual F-15. There was a plane in front of me, a Lockheed XF-90. From the stylized hawk insignia, I recognized the pilot of the plane. It was Blackhawk, my flight lead._

 _There was a city beneath us. It was burning. Smoke billowed from large buildings, and I could even see the fire sprouting from the windows. People were running on the streets. I couldn't hear their screams, but I felt it. I felt their panic, their despair. The night sky was dark, and yet, it seemed unsettled, not like the usual calm sky I usually see whenever I was stargazing. There were no moon, no stars, only an endless span of stormy clouds._

 _From the distance, I could hear the rumble of several fighter jets. I turned around to look for them, and there it was; several black planes standing out against the burning city. They were flying low, as if they were trying to avoid radar. As if they were trying to avoid us._

 _Before I could try to figure out why they were there, all four planes swept up towards Blackhawk and me, their missiles already locked onto the both of us. It was only pure luck that I managed to avoid the two that were heading my way. Blackhawk managed to do the same, and I felt myself grin. He wasn't my brother for no reason._

 _"We'll get them, buddy," Blackhawk said to me through the radio. At the same time, he twisted his plane to get behind an enemy plane. "This one's mine."_

 _I laughed. "Sure it is. Finders, keepers, loser. I'll get 'im first."_

 _I waited for Blackhawk to reply. But he didn't. He was never one to let chirps go. He always chirped back . Something was wrong. "Blackhawk?" I tried, hoping that he'd reply. Even though I could see him, not having him responding to me felt strange. It felt surreal and scary at the same time. "Blackhawk!"_

 _Still no reply. Before I could try again, one of the other enemy planes went after me. I saw it through my rearview mirror. I tried to roll out of the way, but the damned bastard was faster than I thought. It wasn't long before the red wing of my Eagle was riddled with bullets. The impact jostled my plane, and on instinct, I turned around to see the damage. Somehow, some of the bullets managed to hit a fuel line. With the fuel leaking, I couldn't see the wing. Just like that day…_

 _"Larry? Are you okay?" Blackhawk's worried squawk through the radio brought me out of my reverie. He was flying by my side, as if to check if I was okay. Sometime between I was shot and his transmission, the scenery had changed. The dark sky was replaced by clear blue ones with not a cloud in sight, and the burning city was nowhere in sight. In its place was the barren mountain range that was the B7R._

 _It would've been perfect if the enemy had also disappeared. They hadn't. Just my luck._

 _"I'm fine, Sebastian," I replied. Even as I said so, I noticed that my fuel tanks were being emptied at a worrying pace. It didn't help that I had to keep my throttle all the way up lest I would stall. De ja vu…_

 _"Larry? Can you hear me?" Blackhawk said again. At first, I was confused, but I quickly remembered that he couldn't hear me. My radio must've been busted. I shook the wings of my plane and turned the lights on to show that yes, I could hear him._

 _Before any more words were exchanged, the enemies attacked us once again._

 _Knowing better than to risk a futile fight with a heavily damagted plane, I tried to pull away from the fight. I did, but one of them decided to chase me down. I tried everything I could think off; a cobra, an Immelman, anything to shake him off. Nothing seemed to work. I realized that time was running out. I realized that I was going to die._

 _As if on cue, the enemy launched a missile straight at me. I knew there was no dodging this one, so I just closed my eyes and braced for impact._

 _The missile never hit me. Instead, it hit Blackhawk. I froze as I realized what had happened. He actually…_

 _"Blackhawk, get out of there!" I shouted. His engine was hit, his plane was a mess, and fuck, was his cockpit actually on fire? "Blackhawk!"_

 _There was no reply from him. I could only stare as his plane exploded into a brilliant ball of fire._

 _"BLACKHAWK!"_

…

With a gasp, I sat up, fully awake and sweating. I looked around me. I wasn't in a burning plane anymore, staring at the exploding remains of my brother's plane. I was back in my room, in Valais Air Base.

It had been a dream.

Sighing, I rubbed a hand over my face to wake myself up just a bit more. The dream felt so real, I couldn't tell if I was really dreaming or not. It was unnerving. I could still feel the ghostly feeling of an overheated control panel lingering in my hands, stinging me as I tried to touch the button that would put the landing gear down. My ears were still ringing from the sound of missile alerts and the sound of Blackhawk shouting at me through the radio. Blackhawk… Just to check, I turned to the bunk below mine. To my dismay, it was empty. It looked as if it hadn't been slept on for days.

The dream was both a dream and not a dream.

I felt a pang as I remembered what had happened a few days ago. Even though I'd known about it all those time, it still hurt as much. I'd start the day, thinking that Blackhawk was still there. That the only reason he wasn't in the bed was that he was out on patrol flight. But it all went away when I saw the folded Ustian flag on the desk.

It was kind of ironic to have that flag, especially since we were both Belkans and we were both fighting our country in this stupid war. It wasn't that we resented fighting it, though. What Belka did was unforgiveable, up to the point where I was ashamed to call myself a Belkan.

A few weeks ago, Belka began an invasion on its neighbouring countries. The first to be attacked was Nostrand, which also happened to be one of its primary targets. Belka was renown for their amazing Air Force. Their pilots were legends. If Belka was good, Nostrand was better. I'd seen first hand evidence to back up that rumor. To say I was afraid when facing that Nostrandic pilot was an understatement. I felt like he was the personification of death himself. Luckily for me and my life, I was put up against him in a practice dogfight.

Since Nostrand beat Belka in their only strength, Belka decided to take that out first, and fast. The invasion was swift and silent; it only took hours for Warsaw, the nation's capital city, to fall into the hands of Belkan soldiers. The president and the entire cabinet were executed on live broadcast. It was only then that the rest of the world realized what had happened. Belka had decimated the nation's entire military forces, raiding base after base and leaving no survivor. It was the same case with the poor civilians who happened to witness them.

It was the beginning of Belka's invasion on every country near them; it was the start of the Belkan War.

Basically everyone in the entire world was outraged by what Belka did. Their invasion broke every single law of modern military combat. It was unspeakable. I shuddered. To think that what once was my beloved country did such a thing…

Shaking my head off of the thought, I stood up. The mountain air was cold, but not unwelcome. It felt soothing. Only several parts of Belka was colder than this mountain. It was almost reminiscent of home.

Putting off my jacket, I walked out of my room. There was no use staying in a place where there was a constant reminder of Blackhawk. The base was practically empty. Only several of the guards were awake, and that was solely because of watch duty. I glanced at my watch. It was 2 a.m.

No wonder, then.

Realizing that there must've been a patrol flight, I turned towards the Control Tower. I'd know since I saw the schedule. If I wasn't mistaken, the squadron that was supposed to do patrol at this hour was Tiger Squadron and the two mercenaries that were assigned with them. I wasn't all that familiar with them, so I didn't know their real names, only their callsigns.

I knocked on the door of the Control Room. I was surprised to hear someone say, "Come in." Normally, the night owls at the Control Tower were either too tired to notice someone knocking at the door or were using their headphones so they couldn't hear a knock. I opened the door, and found that I was right. They were all using headphones. Well, all of them did except the Base Commander.

Base Commander Ovechkin was the emperor of Valais Air Base. He was the one who kept things running in order. He was also the one who made the call to haul in mercenaries to strengthen Ustio's Air Force; it was a call that didn't sit well with the top brass. But in the end, it was one of the reasons that Valais Air Base was the last one standing. Despite being of Yuktobanian descent, the Base Commander was loyal to Ustio, and was an Ustian himself.

I snapped a salute at the Commander, who returned it. He grinned. "Lt. Foulke. What brings you here so early?"

Since it wouldn't be appropriate to say that it was a nightmare, instead, I said, "I was wondering if I could start flying, sir."

Ever since what had happened with Blackhawk, the Base Commander decided to keep me grounded until I got a wingman of my own. I understood. With the war, it was too dangerous for anyone to fly solo, and every single pilot was valuable at this stage. But it didn't mean that the order sat well with me. Flying was in my blood. You could never keep a beast inside its cage for long before it goes mad and breaks loose.

The Base Commander sighed. "We've been over this, Foulke. We can't let you fly until you have a wingman."

I couldn't help but stare at the floor dejectedly. "Yes, sir," I replied automatically.

"There is an open slot for you, though," the Base Commander said after a while. "But it's with the Tiger Squadron. Which means you have to be an Air Force pilot."

The perks of being a mercenary… As much as I loved flying, I wasn't willing to go through the whole Air Force crap again. Flying was good, but strict Air Forces and stupid protocols just weren't my style. "No, thanks, sir," I said politely. "I think I'd wait a little longer."

The Base Commander nodded. He was about to say something else when one of the radar operators tore off his headphones and turned to the Commander, saying, "Sir, I think you should see this."

The Base Commander went quickly to said radar monitor. Out of curiosity, I followed. The radar showed five planes at the edge of our airspace. Four were marked as Belkans and hostile. Apparently, they were chasing the other one. Now who that was was still a mystery…

The radar couldn't identify the lone aircraft. It was marked as an unknown F-15C. The radar operator pulled out his headphone from the audio jack, and suddenly, radio chatter blared through the speakers. "This is 2nd Lt. Jackson of the Nostrandic Air Force. I am being chased by four Belkan pilots. Request immediate help. These are my coordinates…"

I couldn't believe my hearing. A Nostrand was fighting off four Belkans right here in our airspace?! "This is Valais Air Base," Commander Ovechkin said to the microphone he just grabbed from the radar operator. "We read you, 2nd Lieutenant. What is your situation?"

"I'm low on fuel," came the reply a few seconds later. I could hear some alert system going off in the background, probably warning that a missile was locked on to the plane. "I only have enough to go for another hundred miles or so." That's barely enough for him to reach Valais…

The radar operator turned to Commander Ovechkin. "What is your call, sir?"

I looked at the Base Commander. He seemed torn. At one hand, it wouldn't be right to not help out someone from Nostrand. They need all the help they could get. On the other, it could very well be a ploy by the Belkans to smuggle a spy within the ranks of Ustio.

It didn't take long for Ovechkin to answer, "Send Tiger Squad to help. If anyone surrenders, bring them in. If the Nostrandic turns hostile, shoot him. Can't risk it."

"Roger that," the radar operator said with a nod. He turned back to the screen. The lone plane was now turned towards the Belkan formation, apparently going to engage them. "This is Valais Air Base to unknown Nostrandic craft," the operator said to the microphone which somehow had disappeared from the Commander's hands and reappeared in his. "We are sending a patrol over to your position. Surrender now and head over to our base. Our flight will handle the Belkans."

For a few seconds, there was nothing but static from the other end of the radio. I frowned. Was he somehow shot down? Looking towards the radar screen, I noticed that it wasn't the case. There were still five planes on the radar.

"A compromise," the unknown pilot answered. "I fight these guys first, and then your patrol can escort me to your base. I'll surrender peacefully, but in exchange, I want to join your forces as a mercenary."

Well, well, well… Wasn't that an unlikely request? "As if he can fight them all by himself," Ovechkin scoffed. I had to admit, the odds were not in that guy's favor. "Tell him we agree, if he can survive those four. After that, he can join the mercs."

I was barely able to restrain myself from pointing out what a stupid idea it was. For all we know, the guy could be a Belkan spy. And for him to request immediate position in the Air Force (even as a mercenary) was really suspicious. Not trusting myself to remain cool-headed about the whole situation, I walked out of the Control Room and headed straight for the runway. If the "new guy" was going to be here, I might as well see him when he arrived.

…

"You hear about new guy, Larry?"

I looked up to find the leader of Tiger Squadron standing in front of me. Viktor Malkin, also known as Buster in the skies, was practically scowling at me, standing there with his arms crossed in front of his chest. "Yeah," I answered with a shrug. "I was in the Control Room when he first radioed in. Didn't stay long after that."

Viktor sat on the bench across from mine. The mess was mostly empty at the time. It was still really early, and only the pilots on patrol were there. The most likely scenario was that most of the pilots were still asleep. I wouldn't be surprised. Even the sun wasn't even up yet. "What's up with him?" Viktor asked, frowning.

I sighed. "All I know is he's a pilot from Nostrand. How he survived, I didn't know."

"Maybe traitor?" Viktor suggested. "Sold his friends in exchange for life. Something go wrong, he run here."

"It could be," I said. Absent-mindedly, I fiddled with the cup of coffee in my hands. "But I doubt it. Did you see him?"

Viktor shook his head. I looked around, to make sure no one was eavesdropping on us, and said, "He looked like he went through hell. I doubt that he's a Belkan spy." In truth, the guy really looked like it. He was battered and had bruises all over him. Even his flight suit was covered in blood. Whose blood it was I had no idea. I doubted it was his. He wouldn't be alive if he'd lost so many.

I had also noticed that he was actually wearing a genuine Nostrandic flight suit, with all the proper insignias. Moreover, he shot down three of the four Belkan planes chasing him. No Belkan spies would do that. Belka always valued the lives of their pilots; they would never let their pilots die just for the sake of smuggling in a single spy. And to the new guy's credit, the fight looked genuine enough; there was no hint of it being orchestrated.

When Viktor still didn't look convinced, I proceeded, "I was also there when Base Commander interrogated him. And guess what? The reason he's here is because he wants another chance to get at those Belkans. Don't you think that speaks for itself? He's from Nostrand; naturally, he wants revenge for his country."

"Still not like," Viktor argued, leaning forward a bit. "What if he spy? Tell secret to Belka? We die if they get our plans."

"True," I admitted. "But he's being locked in the infirmary now. He's not allowed to go out until he's cleared. There's no way for him to get to our battle plans that way. And don't worry. We'll be monitoring him 24/7."

Viktor laughed. "Locked in infirmary. Only plans he get is medical records. Still risky."

"We need all the pilots we can get, Viktor," I argued. "The Belkans are really good. And he's from Nostrand! You know as well as I do how good they are. That's why they're targeted first."

Grimly, Viktor nodded. He seemed less unhappy now. That was a good sign. "We keep watch on him," he said. "Give him chance. One wrong move, he die."

What else would you expect? "Agreed," I said with a nod. As Viktor stood up, evidently about to leave, I said again, "Will you tell the others?"

"Of course," Viktor nodded, grinning. "Got to be prepared for anything." He turned around and began to walk away, but just before he exited the mess, he stopped and called out. "You fly today?"

To my dismay, the answer was still a no. "Not yet," I said to him. "Soon, I hope." Which was true. I was starting to get sick of being stuck on the ground. You can only run the simulator so much before you get bored. And to consider I had to pay for using said simulator… Air Force pilots had the liberty to use it for free. Mercenaries…not so much.

"Watch out, Larry," Viktor said. "New guy might be wingman." And just like that, he left.

I hadn't even considered that. It wasn't that far-fetched an idea. My team, the Galm team (which right now was only consisted of myself) was the only mercenary team with a vacant slot so far. And we didn't have the luxury of grounding the Halo Squadron for long periods. Halo Squadron was the Air Force Squadron paired with the Galm Team. It was the setup the higher-ups had configured for the half-mercenary-half-military structure of Ustio's 6th Air Division. Each Air Force Squadron would be paired with a mercenary team. Tiger Squadron was paired with Alpha Team. It was an unorthodox approach, but hey, it worked. It was the reason Valais survived as long as it did. And right now, we were the last Air Force Base in Ustio's hands.

To that, I wish the Force be with us all…


	2. glacial skies (part I)

April 2, 1995. 1300 hrs.

Valais Air Base.

 _"It was a cold and snowy day…"_

I was in the middle of playing a card game with Halo Squadron when we were called to a briefing. It was unexpected; there were no briefings scheduled for the time being. Knowing how unusual it was, we mentally prepared ourselves for anything.

Our hunch was right, considering that the briefing started as soon as we entered the dimly lit room.

"Listen up!" The Base Commander's voice boomed throughout the room, even though he wasn't using a microphone or a loudspeaker. We barely had any time to sit before he spoke again, "We have a situation on our hands."

The projector flickered to life, and soon, the wall had a map plastered all over it. It was a map of Ustio. Somehow, I noticed that "Directus" was marked on said map, even when all of us knew that the capital city has fallen to the hands of the Belkans. I winced a bit at that. All of us knew that the top brass was not happy with how we handled Belka's invasion on Directus. But still, there was nothing more that we could've done; Belka timed their attack perfectly. Right now, the only thing that we could do was to focus on the now. And right now, things didn't look so good.

A panel appeared in front of the map, blocking most of it – including Directus – from view. It had several words on it. As I read it, I realized that as urgent as the situation was, someone in Base Command managed the time to pull off all of this. They named the mission "Operation Crossbow". As much as I loved my line of work as a mercenary, sometimes, it was nice to feel the orderly life of the Air Force.

"A major squadron of Belkan bombers has crossed our border and is making its way here, to Valais Air Base," the Base Commander said, confirming our worst thoughts. "Apparently, they intend to attack our base in an initiative to gain hegemony over the entire Republic of Ustio. Valais Air Base is our country's last line of defense. If our base falls, no one will be left to stop Belka from taking over Ustio."

No shit, Commander.

"Your mission is to destroy the squad of bombers and defend our base. Belka's invasion must end here," the Base Commander finished, and the lights were turned on as the projector was turned off. "Any questions?"

My hand was the first to shoot up. "Am I going to fly on this mission?" As much as I enjoyed the slow life of being grounded, I'd really love to fly again. Nothing ever beats the rush you feel when you get on a plane and push it to supersonic speeds.

"Yes, you are, Foulke," the Base Commander answered to my surprise. I hadn't been reassigned to any new teams as far as I knew, so I had no idea who I would fly with. "I've assigned Cipher to Galm Team. Both of you will fly together."

Instinctively, I turned to find Cipher. The newcomer was sitting a row in front of my seat, so I was unable to see his expression. I wondered how he took the news. I knew I was surprised. Not that I disliked the idea of having Cipher as my wingman, because the Nostrandic had to be crazy good to survive being chased by four Belkans and shooting three of them down before landing with a plane riddled with holes. F-15s were sturdy; I'd know since I had first-hand experience, but not everyone could control a damaged plane, especially when they themselves were not in tip-top shape.

Now that we were in the same team, who was going to be flight lead? Before I had a chance to ask, though, the Base Commander said, "Dismissed."

All the pilots walked out of the room at that command. Well, all of them except me did. Even Cipher didn't seem to wonder who was the leader in our flight.

I walked right up to the Base Commander. He seemed to have expected me, since he didn't make a move towards the door like he'd normally do after briefings. After a brief salute, I said, "Sir, who is the flight lead in my team?"

The Base Commander sighed before he answered, "I thought I'd let you decide, Pixy. Both of you have the same rank, but with your experience, by default, you should be flight lead." He smiled at me. If that was the case…

"Why didn't you say so, sir?" I asked. The Base Commander clasped his hands behind his back and looked at me, his expression unreadable. "Since you have the experience," he said, "I trust you to make the decision on the best course for the team."

So it was all up to me, then? "Thank you, sir," I automatically said. What else could you say in that situation?

"Now get going, pilot," the Base Commander said. "Those bombers aren't going to shoot themselves down." Taking my cue, I snapped a salute before going off to the hangars. As I walked, I realized that I really didn't know how I would deal with this "little" problem of mine. I didn't know Cipher that much; no one did. And apart from his scuffle with the Belkans just before he came to base, I had no idea how good he actually was in the air. Even though I was in the Control Tower when I saw Cipher's and the Belkans' planes enter the airspace, I couldn't tell how he fought them off.

Come to think of it, it was pretty impressive. He fought off four Belkans all the way from Nostrand to Valais and managed to shoot down three of them before our patrol could come to his aid. He was good, I was willing to admit that much. But could I trust him with the position of flight lead?

Minutes later, when I took flight to the skies, I've made up my mind.

…

"Hey, Pixy, who'd you think will bag the most kills today?"

I chuckled as I recognized the voice. It was Daniel Yates, callsign Rowdy. He was the number 3 pilot for the Halo Squadron, one of the last squadrons of the Ustio Air Force in Valais Air Base. Like his callsign suggested, he was always one to talk and keep talking while somehow managing to bag some kills himself. Today was no exception.

"You still bother asking?" Lance replied. His real name was Peter Nolan, and he flew number 2 for his flight lead, Gil "Robin" Favor. "Of course he'd say himself. He's an egocentric bastard," Lance continued, somehow ignoring the fact that I could hear him loud and clear.

"I do bag the most kills though," I retorted at him. As boastful as it sounded, it was the truth. "You're just jealous."

There was a laugh over the comms. "Oh please," Veronique "Scarlet" Addams spoke. "You only get the most kills because Gil lets you to."

Robin, being the strict leader and utter buzz kill that he was, said, "Scarlet, please use callsigns only in missions."

"Aaand… Captain Serious is back," Rowdy said, and all of us laughed. Because, really, the name suited Robin to a tee.

"I'm not Captain Serious," Robin grumbled, which only made us laugh even harder. "Do I get a say in this?"

Lance stopped his laughter long enough to answer, "To answer that question, Captain, I have a huge NO written on signs. Now who do you think will get the most kills?"

"The rookie," Robin answered in a heartbeat. And really, if he hadn't mentioned Cipher, I wouldn't have realized that he was actually with us. He was so quiet. I turned to look where his plane was, just to make sure that he was really there. He was right behind me, taking wingman position.

Guess that explained which position he'd prefer. Oh, well.

"Why'd you pick me?" a new voice said which I only vaguely recognized. It wasn't surprising, since the only time Cipher talked to me at all was when he first came in, and that was through the comms. Even then, he wasn't even talking to me; I had been eavesdropping on the Control Tower.

"Because what you did took guts, rook," Lance said. "Especially since you did it with that banged-up plane. And, if that wasn't enough, it's because you're from Nostrand. Now what's your name again? Chipper?"

I had to prevent myself from laughing, because there was no way that that was unintentional. "It's 'Cipher'," Cipher responded. "And what do you mean it's because I'm from Nostrand? I'm still a trainee even there."

I legit did not know that. He sure didn't fight like a trainee.

There was a soft whistle over the comms. "If trainees there are that good," Rowdy said, "how good are the actual pilots?"

"I wasn't that good," Cipher insisted. Damn, that guy was stubborn.

Scarlet laughed. "'Wasn't'. Yeah, real believable, rookie."

Before any of us could say anything else, there was a transmission over the radio. "This is Base Command. Guess all you boys managed to get up." Our Base Commander sounded really grumpy. I couldn't blame him. After all, this wasn't the first time that our so-called "unnecessary chatter" had caused him to feel irritated during missions. "Galm 1, Galm 2, maintain present course."

Taking that as my cue, I engaged the air brakes on my Eagle, forcing Cipher to end up in front of me. "This is Galm 2. Roger that."

His reaction was instantaneous. "Wha- Wait, hold on a sec. Since when am I-"

"Bearing 3-1-5, Belkan bombers approaching," Base Command said, effectively cutting Cipher off. And just to make sure that he didn't have time to protest my decision, I spoke again, "Nobody wants to bail out into a mountain of ice. We're counting on you, flight leader."

There was a bit of a pause before Cipher said, "Solo Wing, don't you think you're the one who should be flight lead?"

Well, someone had been telling stories. I hadn't even introduced myself, and the rookie already knew who I was. Not even the Base Commander called me 'Solo Wing'. It must be one of the Halo Squadron, Scarlet most likely. She was always friendly towards newcomers. "Nah, I like being Galm 2 better," I replied, trying to sound as casual as I could be. I really didn't mind being number 2. I had always been number 2. I did it with Blackhawk who, all things considered, was practically also a trainee when I made him flight lead for the Galm Team's very first mission. It was years ago. If I could do it with Blackhawk, then I could do it with Cipher.

"Uh… Fine, I guess," Cipher responded. He sounded uncertain, but his reaction was better than I expected. Honestly, I thought he'd freak out, especially since he was actually a trainee. To think that he'd survived Nostrand's demise before he could complete his training…

"All units, prepare to intercept," Base Command said again. I moved so my plane ended up just a bit lower than Cipher's. If I was going to go forward with this wingman thing, I might as well do it the right way.

"You'd better have our pay ready and waiting," I chirped back at him. I'd never tell the Commander this, but so far, amongst all the Base Commanders I knew, he was one of the nicest. He could be a bit of an ass at times, but he was able to keep his head together when in missions. It was critical to do this; a bad start could easily turn into a shitty mission.

"That's only if we both make it through this alive," Base Command chirped back.

At this point, Rowdy decided to jump in. "Of course we will," he said. "We're gonna make quick work on those Belkans. Right, rookie?"

There was a laugh from Cipher as he replied, "We'll send them running back home with their tails between their legs." The change in mood, although unsurprising, was not unwelcome. It was good to see him taking the sudden flight lead thing lightly.

"Great enthusiasm there for a rookie, Cipher," I remarked, chuckling a bit. He reminded me of how giddy Blackhawk was on his first flight. Rookies.

As if reading my thoughts, Cipher bit back, "A rookie who somehow became the flight lead over you."

There was a round of hoots and catcalls after that one. Because really, who would've thought? I certainly didn't, and I made it clear to him when I said in mock anger, " HEY!"

"Don't get cocky, kiddo," Base Command said. "You better do a great job protecting this base. If not, there'll be no base to return to."

I laughed. Like I said, one of the nicest Base Commanders ever. "Trust me, there WILL be a base to return to. If there isn't any, I'll personally kick that rookie in the ass."

"What the h-" Cipher began, but before he could finish, Base Commander said again, laughing, "Sounds like a plan, Galm 2."

I grinned to myself. Everything seemed to be going on smoothly. We would definitely kick those Belkans in the asses. "Be ready to pay up. We'll be back before you know it."


	3. glacial skies (part II)

I noticed the arrival of the Belkans in my plane's radar. Crap. I pulled the plane into a barrel roll, feeling more than a bit excited at the almost distant rumble of the Eagle's engine. The feel of raw power was almost overwhelming. Even with the thousands of hours I've flown, every mission still felt like the first one. Flying does that to you. Every flight was different, there was no two identical missions. Each would be different than the last, and just the thought of it was exhilarating.

I was still doing another barrel rolls when Base Command spoke again, "Galm Team, shoot down all enemy bombers. Don't let them get to our base." I pulled out of my barrel roll just as he continued, "Galm 2, follow all orders from Galm 1. Free engagement is prohibited during this operation."

I rolled my eyes. He must've seen my barrel rolls. Oh, well. "Roger. Awaiting your orders, Cipher. You're Galm 1 now."

"Uh... Okay then. Let's spread out and attack the Belkans at will."

Huh. That was quick. I grinned, "Pixy, roger. Leave 'em to me!" At that exact second, I saw an enemy plane. From the looks of it, it was an F-5. Probably. It wasn't long before I got behind it and pressed the trigger. The cannons in my Eagle roared to life, and I saw the tracers riddling holes in the airplane's frame. Within seconds, the aircraft exploded, and, out of habit, I shouted, "Got him!"

Robin, as strict as ever, said, "Confirmed kill for Galm 2." As if it was necessary.

"Now it's my turn," Cipher said. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him going after an F-4. The plane tried to run away from him, but Cipher had already peppered him with bullets. Out of instinct, I laughed. Ever since Cipher had arrived on base, there were rumors spreading around about him. Even more so that he was from Nostrand. Some of the stories were outrageous; that he was a merciless fighter, a true gladiator. At least no one suggested that he was a Belkan spy. It wasn't that it wouldn't happen. It still could. In thought of this, I said, "Cipher, I've heard stories about you. That pride's gonna get you killed, you know."

"You're one to talk," Cipher replied, laughing. "You're Belkan. Your pride's probably bigger that the size of Osea."

I frowned. I haven't even told him that I'm Belkan. How did he know? "Yeah?" I said, trying my best to ignore it. "At least I'm living up to it."

Cipher snorted. "Doesn't seem like it. Enemy plane on your six."

I looked back and sure enough, there was a plane at my six. I grinned. Despite the fact that the situation could turn worse really quickly, I noticed that the plane was flying unsteadily; it was already a wee bit damaged, probably from the Halo Squadron. All the easier for me. "Ah, hell. It won't be there for long. Watch and learn, rookie." As I said so, I jerked my stick back and decreased my throttle, forcing my plane to a sudden stop. When it was near the point of stalling, the plane shot past me. I increased the throttle and leveled my plane again. The plane was dead in my sights. Several seconds later, he was gone. "Got 'im."

"Showoff," Cipher commented, going after a new target. I was so caught up with the heat of the battle and the feeling of finally flying again that I almost completely forgot that Halo Squadron was with us. Luckily, Lance decided to remind us of their presence. "Pixy. Cipher. Shut up," he said, rolling his plane over mine. I almost expected him to flip me off, but he didn't. "You're making me lose my concentration here."

I laughed. "Hey. It's not like you're doing much shooting anyways."

"HEY!" Lance shouted, almost to the point of deafening me. Damn headphone radios. "Watch your mouth, Galm 2."

Putting my plane as close to his as I dared (which left about three feet of space between us), I said, "Well, you can't prove it, can you?"

There was a tense laughter from Lance. "Really? Watch this." He brought his plane behind an F-5. Two missiles went for him, and the plane exploded. "Lance, Fox Two!"

"Hmm… Not shabby for a newbie," I said, humming under my breath. Because, really, I knew Lance could do much better than that. I knew how good of a shooter he actually was. He was holding back.

"Ah, just leave it, Lance," Rowdy interjected, bringing his plane to a position in front of the both of us. "It's hard to argue with an old-timer like him."

"Old-timer?!" I laughed. "Hey, get back here."

"Hey, you are older than most of us," Cipher said, snickering. Great. Now everyone is ganging up on me.

I huffed. "Hey, if I'm old, then what does that make of Robin?" It was a low blow, but I had to get all the attention somewhere else. No way I'm spending the rest of this mission being trash-talked by everyone, less of all Cipher. He might be my flight lead, but he's still a rookie. He needed to know his place.

"Guys, shut it," Robin grumbled. He was the most distant plane between all of us, already going in deep in the enemy formation. He a bit more eager than usual. "Let's get this job over with and suck up a little hot wine." That explains it.

Rowdy laughed. "Sounds like drinks will be on you today, Halo 1." Trust Rowdy to look for every chance of free drinks.

"As old of a geezer as Robin is, I'm just glad he still knows how to have fun," Lance said, laughing as well. It was an old joke, since Robin was really the oldest. He was at least ten years older than me. Go figure.

"Old geezer?" Cipher said, just a bit incredulous.

Rowdy chuckled, going after yet another plane. "Yeah. Can you imagine if he goes all "if-you-go-against-my-orders-I-will-personally-send-you-all-to-hell"?"

Robin began grumbling again. "How about you shut your yaps or I'll have you go fifty 'round the base with a pack of stones?"

I thought that was a bit harsh. He really must've been in a really bad mood today. "You do that and I'll steal your stash of whatever-you-hid-under-the-snow-behind-the-barracks," Lance said. Everyone knew about Robin's secret stash, but no one dared to actually look for it. Respect and all that, after all. We did have a bet going on about what it was. My guess was that it was a stash of snacks. Scarlet bet that it was stash of secret letters he'd been getting, while Rowdy and Lance swore up and down that it was all booze. As likely as the scenario was, I've never actually seen Robin drunk except during drinks with all of us, and I've made sure that he didn't drink any extras without being seen. So… it could still be anything.

"Now how did you find that out?" Robin asked, clearly surprised. He shouldn't think he's being subtle, because he really wasn't. As if to voice my thoughts, Rowdy chuckled, "You're really not a ninja, Robin."

"You know this, too, Rowdy?" Robin asked again, somehow sounding even more surprised than before. Scarlet laughed, "Hell, I think everyone knows."

"I don't," Cipher quipped. I mentally sighed. The kid really needed to work on his ability to shut up. Not that I could say anything, though. Otherwise, I'd be a hypocrite. "Well, he's a rookie, so don't mind 'im," I said, grinning.

"Hey, even this rookie can tell that the so-called stash wouldn't be donuts," Cipher bit back, laughing even as he said it. "That would be a cliché."

I was about to point out that Robin wasn't a cop when said Captain said incredulously, "Did you check my stash when I wasn't looking, Cipher?"

Oh my God… "Umm... No, I didn't. Why would I?" Cipher said. He sounded confused. I couldn't blame him. Robin groaned, "Don't tell me that was a lucky guess!"

As the realization of what had happened dawned on me, I froze in utter shock. The stash, which we had been betting on for weeks, was actually donuts. It was actually, legit, donuts! Of all things! "Wait, I was right?" Cipher exclaimed. It wasn't long before I said, "It was actually donuts?" Because really, I had to know.

"My God," Lance said with a groan. "Our Captain IS an old geezer."

Our surprise was taken away, however, when Base Commander radioed, "You idiots... Shut up and get them before they blow us all to hell!" Whoops. We must've forgotten that we were in the middle of a mission.

To his credit, Robin did manage to sound genuinely sorry when he said, "Sorry, Base Command. Halo Squadron, cut all chatter."

"Righty-o, Mr. Donut," Scarlet said with a laugh. For a few seconds, it was silent until Base Commander said again, "Aren't you going to say anything, Galm 1?"

Did he really expect the rookie to tell me to shut up?! "Well, you DID tell me to shut up," Cipher pointed out, and I wasn't sorry that I laughed at that one. He had some guts to back talk a superior like that.

"Fine, fine," Base Command grumbled. "Continue with operation."

Speaking of rookies… I scoured the sky, wondering where the hell Cipher was. Because he sure wasn't on my wing like a pilot would do in a normal formation. Although truthfully, he did say to "spread out and attack the Belkans at will".

I found him quite some distance away from me, fighting against a group of planes. I had to admit, he was good. He fooled his opponent with a stall turn before ripping the F-5 to shreds with his guns. Robin must've been watching as well, because right after it happened, he shouted, "Enemy down! Courtesy of Galm 1!"

If Cipher had heard it, he didn't acknowledge it. Instead, he went to join Scarlet who was in the middle of going after a bomber. I couldn't tell what it was. It looked really, really old. I wondered if the Belkans really didn't think that highly of Valais to send such flimsy bombers against our base.

"That bomber looks ancient," Scarlet commented as Cipher joined her, somewhat moving away to give him some space.

"Well, I think I'm going to give it a new look," Cipher said. "Cipher, Fox 2!" Two missiles were launched from his plane and struck the bomber dead center. I grinned, going after a bomber myself. There was no way I was going to let him steal the show.

"One enemy bomber down. Continue with operation," came the radio transmission from Base. I realized that it wasn't the Base Commander; it must've been the guys at the Control Tower. I locked onto the bomber and said, "Got one dead in my sights. Galm 2, Fox Three!" I launched an AMRAAM; I needed a missile with a longer range to shoot the bomber from the distance I was with the target. Actually, it was so far away, but the AMRAAM did the trick. It was a BVRAAM after all.

"2nd enemy bomber down," Control Tower confirmed. "Stay sharp out there!"

"Ha!" I heard Lance laughing over the radio. "I'm gonna come out on top today."

"Like hell I'll let you," Rowdy answered. It wasn't unexpected. Those two were always inseperable. "I'm gonna earn every penny of that money today."

"You're not a mercenary," I reminded him. He really was getting a bit too far. "Stop talking like one."

At the same time, I heard Lance shouting over the radio, "What the- Rowdy, that was mine!"

Looks like someone has been stealing targets. "Seeing as how I shot it down, it's mine now," Rowdy said, and I laughed. Because really, stealing targets like that was just ridiculous and seemed downright desperate. The bugger must've been more than eager to win.

"Damn you…" Lance muttered.

"Gotta keep up, Lance."

Deciding that adding a bit to the fray wouldn't hurt too much, I chimed in, "Easier than getting a candy from a baby, huh, Rowdy?"

"Ya betcha," Rowdy laughed, at the same time Lance muttered, "Fuck off, Pixy." Uh-oh.

"Let's keep all curse words off the radio chatter, shall we, boys?" And there goes Captain Serious. It seemed like he now had another victim for the Swear Jar. Not that the rule was always executed perfectly. Us pilots cursed too much for most people to keep track of.

Out of nowhere, there was another transmission. "This is Otto 5. IFF is out of commission. Unable to carry out duty. Withdrawing from operation airspace." I frowned. There were no units with the callsign Otto in our base, lest of all in the skies right now. It couldn't be one of us, but there was no other explanation. Unless… We must've been hearing the enemy transmission. How or why, I had no idea. Maybe we used the same frequency. Even then, why would we be using the same frequency?

Suddenly I had a really bad feeling about Cipher.


	4. glacial skies (part III)

"One of the bombers has left the battlefront," Robin announced, confirming my thoughts. "He must've chickened out."

"Why would he leave after getting this far?" I asked, trying to find out if we had the same thoughts. I couldn't ask him outright because, well, Cipher was with us. He would hear us, and who knows what he would do if he was an actual spy?

Speaking of which… "Technical malfunction, maybe?" Cipher said, his plane just barely visible through the curtain of falling snow. Damn bad weather… I couldn't even tell if Cipher was chasing an enemy or not. "I dunno. I think I've heard him saying his IFF's broken."

"Yeah, you're right," I replied. "Why and how in hell are we hearing the enemy?" There was a chance he might make a slip and say something suspicious. I just had to be ready to pick it up.

"No idea," Cipher said. "Does it matter?"

Well… Not really. Depends on who you ask, though. "Not really," I replied. "It's just… HOLY SHIT!"

I froze. Right in front of me, a Belkan plane was flying STRAIGHT TOWARDS me. It was probably just a hundred feet away from hitting me. Time seemed to slow down as I jerked the control stick to the left, putting the plane in a barrel roll. My Eagle's reaction – even though I knew that it was in perfect condition – felt sluggish. I was worried that I wouldn't pull it off. It seemed like an eternity as we passed each other with barely a feet separating us. We were so close that if I just stuck my hand out, I could've touched the underbelly of his F-4 Phantom. It was almost surreal.

The spell ended as soon as I shot past him, and I cursed, "Dammit!" Really. Having your life flash before you seconds before impending impact was NOT a fun experience. I was so sure I would die right then and there. As a soldier, you always wondered when your time would come. You always wondered if you were the next one. It was kind of sad. Wars did that to everyone. It was terrifying as it was also mesmerizing in its own peculiar way. I hated it, and yet, the thrill of it kept me going on and on.

"What happened?" Cipher asked, pulling me out of my thoughts. And just like that, I was back in the middle of the battle.

"Damn plane nearly ran into me," I answered. I quickly looked around for that plane. I had to pay him back for that little stunt. Shooting your enemy is acceptable; that is how you win. But ramming straight into them? That's cowardice. I hadn't realized the Belkan Air Force was so desperate that they'd stoop that low. Now that I knew, though, I was on guard. There was no way they'd get me again.

At that moment, I spotted the plane. I grinned and went after him. "Come 'ere, you little…" The enemy didn't seem to notice that I was there. He just kept going in a straight line. It wasn't hard for me to line myself up behind him for a shot. "Pixy, Fox 2!" I let loose a missile from under my wing. It had no trouble to track down the F-4 and obliterate it.

Bull's-eye.

"Looks like they wanna finish us off," I heard Lance say over the radio. Looking over my shoulder, I saw that he was some ways behind me, and was in the perfect position to see me nearly being rammed into earlier. He must've seen it. Then, I noticed that someone was chasing him. "This one's on me like a leech!"

I slammed on the brakes and did a tight loop to turn around, heading straight over to him. "Not when I'm around," I said, already locking onto the enemy. "Hang on, Lance. I'll get him outta your six." This – the teamwork between air force squads and mercenary teams – was the reason Valais got this far (and hopefully help Ustio regain its territory and win this god-forsaken war).

Within seconds, the enemy plane was nothing but smithereens, and Lance wasn't even damaged. At least, apart from a few bullet holes here and there. "Not so high and mighty now, are you, Lance?" Rowdy teased, getting to his rightful place on Lance's wing. Even though I knew he couldn't see me, I glared at his direction before leaving to handle some more enemies. He shouldn't have left Lance alone like that; he was his wingman after all. Too much of us pilots have died because of simple mistakes like that.

"Shut up, Rowdy," Lance scolded, sounding (rightfully) grumpy. "Thanks, Pix. I owe you one."

"No problem," I answered, going after another enemy plane. "Just don't make a habit of it."

"I don't intend to."

I quickly shot down the plane I was after. It was an old F-5 and was no match for my newer Eagle. I looked around, hoping to spot Cipher. When I couldn't see him, I looked to the radar. And voila! He was actually 5,000 feet above me, going after a stray Belkan plane. Why a Belkan went that high up, I had no idea, but I was glad that Cipher caught on to him. Who knew what he could have done had he gone on unnoticed? On that note, I went up to join him. Two heads are always better than one.

When I got there, though, I saw that the plane was no ordinary plane. It was an F-117; a spy plane. It would've been undetected by the radar had he not been carrying a shitload of bombs under its wings. I growled as I realized what his real plans were; to bomb Valais while we were distracted by the fighters and the bombers below us. It actually explained why they were only using old bombers for the bombing squadron. They were just decoys; the real one was high up.

Thankfully for everyone, Cipher managed to shoot it down. "Galm 1 shot down a bandit!" I cheered. I couldn't help myself. Cipher might as well just saved all of us from being blown to bits. Well, technically, he saved the guys on Valais, but it was still the same thing.

"See?" Cipher laughed. "That so-called "pride" you said I have wasn't so hard to live up to."

He was getting cocky. It was eerily like how cocky Blackhawk was. "That's enough babbling," I said. I had enough reminder of how I let Blackhawk down. I didn't need any more of it.

"Something wrong, Pixy?" Cipher asked. My reaction must've confused him. "It's none of your business," I replied, going back down to where the battle was raging on. "Just drop it, Cipher."

"Pixy?"

"I said drop it!" I snapped. Somehow, I noticed that there was no more radio chatter on the background. The guys must've been listening in on us. Nosey bastards.

The silence was finally broken by a dejected, "Fine," from Cipher. Feeling a bit bad, I looked for him. He was no longer in the high skies. Like me, he had gone down to see the battle. Only, unlike me, he hadn't been paying attention so well. There was a plane behind him. He was so fixated on the bomber in front of him that he didn't notice the enemy lining up for a shot at him.

"Watch out!" I shouted, turning my plane simultaneously to help him. "The enemy's locked on to you!"

"Huh?" Cipher muttered. He hadn't even moved, and the plane was getting closer. "Hey, when did you get back there?"

I was still too far to help him when a missile went for him from the enemy plane. For a second, everything stopped, and Cipher's Eagle metamorphosed to Blackhawk's XF-90. It was all too real.

It was sickening.

"Galm 1! Missile! Missile inbound!"

I could only watch as the missile got closer to Cipher. This time, Cipher didn't just stay still. He moved his plane, pointing its nose straight to the sky. The missile followed his movement, but Cipher was much, much faster. He placed distance between them easily. Just as I was feeling relieved that he wasn't hit, he suddenly braked, forcing his plane to stall and head straight to the ground. I gaped. I knew he was crazy, but not to that extent. What happened after was even crazier. Somehow, in the short time he'd bought himself, Cipher managed to lock onto the enemy plane and send a missile at him. And as if it wasn't enough, he also managed to somehow roll out of the way of the earlier missile, allowing it to continue its trajectory upwards and explode harmlessly in the sky. To top it off, his own missile managed to hit the enemy plane.

"He dodged it," I muttered, still too shocked to say anything else. I didn't care if he was only a trainee from Nostrand. All I knew was that he was crazy good. A bit suicidal, perhaps. Okay, he was really suicidal. But it worked.

"Looks like you'll be giving Pixy a run for his money, Cipher," Rowdy said with a laugh. Looks like the whole gang watched Cipher's stunt.

"Give a run for- I'll give you a run for your money, Rowdy." I lined myself up. In front of me was a wide open space with practically nothing except a squad of bombers and fighters, probably the second wave of Belka's invasion on Valais. They didn't seem to notice my presence, as they didn't move away or make any attempt to get away. To be fair, they were still far away. None of my regular missiles would've locked onto them. What they didn't know was that I had AMRAAMs. Those babies packed a sucker punch and could sneak on them like a fox. They'd never see it coming. I let loose all four of them remaining at once, shouting, "Pixy, Fox Three!"

The results? Two fighters down and two bombers hit. The hit bombers seemed to be damaged pretty badly, since they didn't continue their pursue and just turned around for a retreat. "Bandits down," I announced.

Scarlet laughed. "Looks like Galm 2 is gonna steal the show again."

"Come on, Pixy," Lance whined. "Leave a few for us, will ya?"

"Just look at all the kills you racked up so far," Rowdy pointed out. "Don't you have enough fighters downed for one day?"

"Don't blame me. It's Cipher who shot them down. Not me." It was actually true. All I shot so far were (mostly) bombers. If anyone was doing a major killing of the Belkan fighters, it would be either the Halo Squad or Cipher. And seeing as Rowdy and Lance were shooting their mouths off rather than shooting the Belkans…

"Says the guy who just shot down a bomber himself," Cipher drawled.

I grinned. "Well, it is our job to shoot them down, you know?"

"But at least let us get some of them!" Lance whined again.

"The world won't end just because you let your prey go, Pixy," Scarlet said, agreeing with Lance.

She was right, but we couldn't take unnecessary risks at war. "The world might not end, but our base might end up a crater on the ground."

"I don't think they'd blow it up with a nuke," Cipher said, sounding a bit worried. "The Belkans aren't that crazy, are they?"

I really had no idea if they were that crazy. All I knew was that I could be a bit crazy at times. It was possible that all Belkans were like that. All my friends (that were Belkan) were like that, so I assumed that it was the case. Still, it's better not to take risks. "Let's not find out and just stop them. Galm Team can finish this job and anything else they throw at us."

Just as I expected, there was a howl of indignation from everyone at Halo Squadron at that remark. "What are we? Chopped liver?!" Rowdy shouted angrily. I knew they wouldn't just let us get a jab at them and get away with it.

"If some of them Belkans escape the grasp of the "almighty Solo Wing Pixy", us the Halo Squadron will take care of them," Robin said, joining in to "defend" his squadron's honor. Air Force pilots…

"I don't know... Considering that the four of you lot couldn't stop eight fighters last time... I don't think so."

There was a scoff over the radio. "Thanks for that vote of confidence, Galm 2," Robin said again. "Now get back to your flight lead and stop bickering with my wingmen."

"It would be easier if I could actually find my flight lead…" It was the truth. Somehow, after that crazy stunt, Cipher slipped from my watch. How, I had no idea. I hoped it wasn't because he was shot down…

"Hey, you know I can hear you, right?" It was Cipher. Guess that answered my question.

There was a groan over the mic. "All of you are idiots," Gil muttered, before continuing, "All right, Halo Squad. There's another wave of bombers heading our way. Form up on me. Time to wipe out these Belkans."

In all reality, that wasn't such a bad idea. The other bombers were practically shot down or too damaged to continue, so we might as well head out to greet the newcomers. If only I could- No need. There he was, already heading out to follow Robin. If I didn't know better, I'd say Cipher was following the "spread out and attack at will" plan a bit too much.

I was beginning to follow them when I saw Cipher go after a bomber. He went straight at him, not caring that an escort Belkan fighter was beginning to take interest in his plane.


	5. glacial skies (part IV)

"Watch out," I warned him. "The enemy's tracking you on radar."

I saw his plane rolled out of the way as he laughed, "I got it. Don't be such a worry wart."

"With all your crazy flying, someone's bound to be one!" I replied.

"Hey, I survived this long, didn't I?" Cipher argued.

I rolled my eyes. "Yeah, yeah… Smartass."

As soon as he took care of the escort plane, Cipher went back to getting after the bomber. "Uh-oh."

What now? "What uh-oh?" I groaned. "Don't tell me you're shot down." Because if he did, I would shoot him down. Even a near-sighted guy could see that his plane was still all right.

"If I'm shot down, I wouldn't be talking to you in the first place." A valid point.

"…You have a point there."

"Pixy, run an ammo check, will ya?" Now that was unusual. Why would he- Oh. My ammo was quite low, it turned out. This battle was longer than I thought, thanks to some people who couldn't shut up.

"Wait a sec… I've got half my gun and five missiles." Sadly for me, no AMRAAMs. Which meant that even if I wanted to, I couldn't shoot down anyone targeting Cipher. They were out of range by a long way.

"My gun's less than half and I'm winchester on missiles." Well, if I was bad, Cipher was worse. The rookie would have to use his gun all the way from here.

"Why do you ask?"

"Can you shoot down this bomber I'm after?"

At this point, Cipher, the bomber and whoever-else-might-be-on-his-tail (if there was any) had gone into the clouds. I couldn't find them even if I tried. "I can't see you," I told him. "Even if I can, I can't lock on. I'm out of AMRAAMs. Why don't you use your guns?"

"I would've but the sucker behind that plane's guns got some pretty fancy shooting." Ah. So it was NOT a fighter that was troubling him. It was the bomber's gunners. No wonder, then. There was still one problem, though.

"Dammit... I'm on the other side of the airspace..."

There was a bustle of radio chatter out of a sudden. I couldn't tell what it was, they were all too drowned out by the static. Maybe it was someone a bit further away from me. Or should I say some squadron? "Say no more, Galm 1," I heard Scarlet say. Her plane appeared from the horizon a second later, going straight towards a cloud formation. At the same time, two planes came out of said cloud formation; a bomber and a fighter. It was Cipher and his bomber. She was quick to get behind them and said, "I'll turn them to scrap metal in no time."

However, she was a bit too brash in her maneuvering and almost collided with Cipher. Luckily, my wingman had quick reflexes. "Whoa! Hold your horses, Scarlet," he said, rolling out of Scarlet's way. "You could've killed me."

"But I didn't," Scarlet pointed out. "Live life dangerously once in a while, Cipher. Try to have fun." As if his flying wasn't dangerous enough… I didn't need my flight elad to turn crazier because of Scarlet. I had enough trouble as it was.

I groaned. "Scarlet, I don't need you to encourage him to be any more suicidal than he already is. Stop it."

"Suicidal?" Cipher inquired.

"Yeah. You've got a better name for it? If so, let's hear it?"

"I'm sure I- Enemy behind us! Scarlet! Jink!"

I immediately turned to find Cipher and Scarlet, already disengaging from the fighter I'd initially wanted to chase. So much for the money I'd get for shooting that one, but they weren't mandatory targets anyway.

As soon as I saw Cipher, sure enough, there was a plane on his tail. I seriously thought I couldn't let this guy fly unsupervised. Every time I turned around, he's have a plane on his tail.

This one almost got him, though. He didn't shoot with missiles like his comrades did; he shot at Cipher with his guns. Guns were far trickier to evade than missiles, particularly because they were harder to see and because this method allowed an enemy to engage a fighter without warning them by locking on to them.

Sure enough, Cipher sounded like he was in trouble. I heard the bullets hit his plane through background chatter on his radio. I couldn't see smoke coming out from his plane (which was lucky) but it still didn't sound good. I saw Scarlet heading over to engage the new bandit, but I was already on the way, even with knowing that she would probably already handle it by the time I got there.

"You bastard!" she shouted, already behind the bandit. "I'll get you for that one. Scarlet, Fox Two! ... Bandit down."

Finally managing to get to Cipher, I was quick to inspect the damage on his plane. It didn't look so good. "You're hit," I said. "Everything okay, Cipher?"

Distinctly, I noticed Scarlet slipping away from us to rejoin the Halo Squadron. "Don't sweat it, Pixy," Cipher said nonchalantly. "It's nothing."

I almost had to remind myself that he wasn't Blackhawk. In a lot of ways, he acted like my old flight lead. And hell if I let him go without checking his plane damage… When the same thing happened to Blackhawk, he ended up with a busted engine and was forced to glide his plane down for the entire landing. FYI, he almost didn't make it to the runway. "Run a thorough plane check now," I said sternly to him, hoping he'd get the point. "I don't want to hear any excuses later."

"Who are you? My instructor pilot?"

I groaned. "Just do it, will ya?"

There was a sigh over the radio. "Fine, fine. Elevators...checked. Ailerons...checked. Rudders...uh-oh."

Again? Nothing good ever come from everything related to "uh-oh", and we've had two of them so far. Cipher was practically impossible. Even Blackhawk didn't get into trouble this often. "Cipher, what's wrong?"

"I think my rudder's toast." Looking at his rudder, I saw that he was right. His rudders were destroyed.

"Your rudder's shredded to bits," I pointed out to him. "I think you need to get ba-"

"I can handle it," Cipher said, cutting me off.

"Don't underestimate anything." That's the last thing I needed him to do.

Cipher laughed. "I'm not. Now let's get back to the furball. Can't let Halo Squad get all the fun." Well, if he said so, I couldn't stop him even if I tried.

It didn't take long for us to find our way into said furball; the Belkan formation was pretty much scattered, most of them fleeing back to their base. Those who were left were being dealt with by the Halo Squadron. While I knew that they could handle it (not that I would ever admit it) I would rather lend a helping hand anyways. Besides, helping meant more money on my paycheck, and a little dough never hurt anyone. Too bad that all the bombers were already shot down; Lance just shot the last one. All Cipher and I could do was salvage what we could from the fighters. It wasn't an easy job. Those nasty little buggers were…well, nasty.

"Aw, shoot," Rowdy remarked. At first, I thought that he was in trouble. "Pixy and Cipher are back."

Now that I knew that, the next time he's in a scrap, he would be on his own. "Bet you're getting much less kills from now on, eh, Rowdy?" Robin laughed. Just to prove a point, I looked around for any target to go after. And it turned out that there was still one bomber left. I had been wrong; the last bomber was not shot down by Lance. It was being chased down by Scarlet.

Not for long…

"Just let them," Scarlet said to Rowdy. "It's nothing we can't han- HEY!"

I grinned to myself as the two missiles I had sent after the bomber struck its target. "Bomber down," I said, just to add some salt to injury.

"That's mine, Pixy!" Scarlet shouted, indignance lacing her voice. I merely laughed. "I don't have time for that. It's every man for himself."

"I'm a woman, ya nitwit," Scarlet pointed out. Which was true. "Be a gentleman and let a lady get her fill."

There was a howl of laughter from the others at that one. All of them knew that Scarlet got me good. I groaned. "Fine, it's every PERSON for themselves. Happy now?"

"You're impossible," Scarlet laughed, and I couldn't help but laugh back.

"And proud of it."

"Hey, now," Robin said, flying up to Scarlet's wing. "Stop flirting, you two."

"Jealous, Robin? Calm your engines. I'll back off your girl. Now where's my flight lead?" Yeah… I was ashamed to admit that I had lost track of Cipher… again.

Lance wasted no time to give me hell for it. "You lost him AGAIN? You're a bad wingman, Pixy."

Luckily for me, I found him quickly enough. He was in the tail of yet another fighter. How many did that rookie shot down anyway? "There he is-" All of a sudden, I saw a plane going after him (again). How many times did that happen in one mission? "Missile inbound! Break! Break!"

Every time I looked away, the kid was practically near death. It was as if the whole Belkan Air Force had decided to go after him. The rookie was going to be the death of me, provided that he managed to keep himself alive long enough to do that.

"Calm down, will ya?" Cipher said. "I threw it off already."

It wasn't for long, though. The plane was quick to get back on Cipher's six. He was actually pretty good. He had to be an ace, or at least an experienced pilot. And considering Cipher was just a trainee, I knew I had to step in. For both our sakes. "Hang on," I said, already pushing my throttle to the max to go after them. "I'll get there. Try not to die."

"Easier said than done…"

The plane threw another missile at Cipher, but he managed to dodge it. They played cat-and-mouse for a while; Cipher making crazy turns and barrel rolls to escape and the enemy matching his moves with frightening accuracy. Frankly, I was impressed that Cipher survived that long.

Aiming my plane towards the enemy "ace," I peppered his plane with bullets. I watched him beginning to trail smoke for a while before exploding. "That's one less plane to worry about," I reported.

"Thanks for clearing my six, buddy," Cipher said, his voice obviously cheerful. I couldn't help but grin at that. A lot of mercenaries were strictly professional, keeping a business-only attitude and only caring for themselves. However funny it might sounded, Cipher didn't strike me as that type.

The moment was ruined when my missile alert began to scream at my ears. At the same time, Cipher shouted, "Pixy! Enemy on your tail! Jink! Jink!"

I didn't have time to react before an explosion shook my plane. I was rocked forward by the impact of what seemed like a missile, but thankfully I managed to keep myself from hitting my head on the canopy. To my surprise, only a small amount of warning lights were turned on. If I was hit, it should've been more catastrophic than this.

I got my answer not a moment too soon. "The missile blew off your right wing," Cipher said. "Anything busted?"

That explained it. "Nah, I'm good. Now to get that bastard."

"Too late," Cipher said, sounding far too smug for my liking. "I splashed him."

It turned out that Cipher didn't make a bad wingman. Maybe he should've been Galm Two. At least he wouldn't lose his flight lead every five minutes or so. But that was still up for debate. After all, this mission was the only one where I'd flown with him. It was interesting, to say the least.

Speaking of missions…

"Base Command to Galm Team," Base Command radioed in. "The enemy attack unit has been successfully intercepted. All planes, job well done! You'll be paid well for this."

I grinned. It was my first mission after Blackhawk, and it was a successful one, too. I looked back to find Cipher at my wing, even though he was the flight lead. As I looked back at his plane, I realized that it looked…ordinary. The Eagle was too military; it lacked the paint schemes that were normally associated with mercenaries. And I knew for sure that Cipher wasn't in an Air Force anymore.

It looked like I would have to teach him the "rules" of being a mercenary. "Cipher," I said, thinking carefully of what I was about to say. "I got a feeling you and me are gonna get along just fine… Buddy."

"Okay, pal," Cipher said, obviously feeling chipper. "Let's get back to base. It's getting too cold to suit me."

"You hate snow?" I teased. If that was the case, I sure as hell knew what I would be doing as a pastime now.

"Not really. Just don't fancy it much." My mind was made up. I would definitely hit Cipher with a snowball sometime in the near future.

"Race back to base?"

Cipher snorted. "You're gonna lose."

If the rookie thought that, he would have a whole other thing coming. "Not a chance."

"It's on."

In the end, I did win that race. But as I landed on the tarmac, I could help but think that…he had potential.


	6. in-between 1a

April 3, 1995 – April 14, 1995  
Valais Air Base.

I was lounging around in my bed, just reading a book when someone banged on the door like they were trying to wake up the dead. "Door's open!" I shouted. The door opened and sure enough, it was Viktor Malkin. He was a good guy, but sometimes, the Yuktobanian really needed to learn when he needed to tone it down a bit. "What's wrong?"

"The rookie," Viktor said, not missing a beat. He looked downright unhappy. "He suspicious? Need me to kick his ass?"

Somehow, I must've forgotten to told him after the mission yesterday. But in all honesty, he told me to keep an eye on Cipher, not to tell him what I found while keeping said eye on my flight lead.

"And why you make him flight lead?"

I shrugged. "It's easier for me to keep an eye on him if he was my flight lead."

Viktor looked downright sceptic of what I just said, so I clarified it a bit. "I'm behind him. There's no way for him to do anything without me seeing him." I would never – never, I tell you – admit to Viktor that I lost him several times during the mission. Not in a million years.

"Weird logic, Foulke," Viktor remarked, scowling as he sat down on my desk. "Weird, even for you."

"Is it weird weird, or just weird?"

Viktor growled. Sometimes, I had to remind myself that English wasn't the guy's first language. Not that it was mine, either. It was just… I had been a mercenary for so long, working for English-speaking countries for so long, that I found myself now thinking in English most of the time and not Belkan. It wasn't that far-fetched. If I was bad, Blackhawk was way worse. By the time he was working for Ustio, his Belkan was so rusty that he could only stick to simple greetings and normal, casual talks.

"Fine, I get it," I said in defeat. Comprehensible English was probably best to use when you deal with Malkin. "But I have always been Galm 2. It's… hard to change things."

It took a while for Viktor to take it in, but once he did, he nodded in understanding. "Okay," he said. "But watch out. He make bad calls, risk team, risk mission, he die."

What else could I expect from him? "I can't argue with that," I agreed (somewhat). "But from what I've seen, he's a good guy, Vik. Just trust him. I trust him. You trust me in this?"

"Enough to not kill him on sight."

I guess that was all I could hope for. "That's all I'm asking for. So… How's the squadron?" Being pissed about Cipher couldn't be the only reason Viktor looked the way he did. He looked ready to murder someone. Even if he said he'd kill Cipher if he had to, I didn't think he would really do that.

To be this pissed, something must've happened to his squadron. The Tiger Squadron was the only thing that could make him tick. Well… that and some other reasons. But the squadron was usually a sure bet. "Shark and Kobra are relocated to another squadron."

I winced. Shark and Kobra were the two mercenaries assigned with Tiger Squadron. I was right. It might not be the actual squadron, but it was pretty close. "Who's replacing them?"

"Several new guys," Viktor answered, idly fiddling with a pen on the desk. "Two of them. Called themselves Green Hornets."

I smirked a bit. The name sounded…weird. "Are they good?"

Viktor shook his head. "No idea. Cocky, lazy bastards. Supposed to arrive here soon. Tomorrow, maybe. Only meet them over radio. Sound really annoying, just like-"

Our conversation was interrupted by a knock on the door. I couldn't help but wonder how weird it was. Usually, people only come to see me for mission briefings, and that knock sure as hell didn't sound like Richie's. Richie was Ovechkin's second-in-command. He liked to round up all of us for briefings, even when it wasn't his job.

"Come in," I said for the second time that day.

The door opened, and, to my surprise, it was Cipher who poked his head in. "Hi," he began saying. "Sorry to bother you, but- Oh. I'll come by another time, then."

His eyes were fixed at Viktor's direction, and from his worried face, the Yuktobanian must've been glaring at him. If anyone's glare could kill, it would be Viktor's.

Cipher was about to head out when Viktor said, "No need. I'm done anyways." Cipher looked like he was ready to protest, but Viktor was having none of it. "Seriously. Go talk to your wingman. I head over to meet the Tigers."

Before Cipher could say a word, Viktor was already out of the room. He turned to face me, smiling sheepishly. "Sorry," he said again. "I didn't know that-"

"It's fine," I said, waving him off. "Viktor said so, too. Don't worry about it."

"Okay," Cipher nodded. Then, he fully stepped into the room, and I noticed that he was carrying a duffel bag. What in the hell was going on? "Um, the Base Commander released me from the infirmary."

"I've noticed as much."

"Yeah… Well, he told me that I'm assigned here."

He couldn't be serious… "You're my roommate?" It wasn't that I didn't like the idea. It's just… It would take some getting used to. While I was definitely NOT used to having to stay in an empty room where Blackhawk used to stay with me, the idea that Blackhawk was really gone hadn't really gotten into my head. I knew that he was gone for a while now, but the idea was just hard to grasp. The fact that he was my only wingman in my entire career didn't help, either. Nor did the fact that I technically had replaced Blackhawk with Cipher.

"Basically, yeah," Cipher answered, interjecting into my thoughts. "If you mind… Maybe I can transfer to a new room."

A new flight lead, and already I gave him the wrong impression. It would be one long war if I couldn't get along with my wingman. "It's perfectly fine," I said, hoping that he'd buy it. "I was just… Well, my room's a bit messy."

Cipher chuckled. "I've noticed as much," he said, quoting me back. I glared at him, but said nothing. My room really was a mess. There were several books scattered here and there. I still had a pile of clothes (and one flight suit) that I had yet to give to the laundry staff. Not to mention, there were a lot of pieces of paper lying around the place.

A bit messy would be an understatement. "This mess alright with you?"

"I've lived with worse," Cipher said, dropping his bag to the floor. He glanced around before looking back at me. "So I take it that you take the top bunk?"

I quirked an eyebrow at him. "You got a problem with that? Just remember. I've stayed here longer."

"I'm the flight lead," Cipher argued back. And wow, that one actually stung. I've never thought I'd live to see a decision of mine biting me back in the ass.

"You want top bunk?"

"Nah," Cipher answered to my surprise, picking up his duffel bag and tossing it onto the lower bunk. "I like the lower one, actually."

"Why?" I asked. Because I had to know. People usually prefer the top bunks.

"If I fell off, there wouldn't be as much of a fall."

"You're weird," I pointed out to him. "Why would you fall off a bed?"

He glared at me. "I never did it on purpose. The last time I fell was when my b- when someone else had taken the lower bunk."

I frowned. That slip-up… He changed his answer. Why? He was hiding something, that much I could tell. Perhaps it didn't matter. It didn't feel like it mattered. It just sparked my curiosity a bit.

"I ended up breaking my arm," Cipher finished, somehow managing to grin as he said so. Breaking bones were no painful matter. How could he grin about it?

"Did you hit your head while you're at it? If so, that could explain your suicidal tendencies."

Cipher glared at me at that remark. "I'm not suicidal."

"How many times did you almost die in the last mission?" I asked him. "If it's more than five, then you're suicidal."

"Our job has a high mortality rate," Cipher argued. "Besides, near-deaths are the reason I signed up."

Even though I could see his point, in my opinion, Cipher was crazy. Like, he was officially, legit crazy. I wondered how he survived this long. Then again, he hadn't been in the air as long as I had. Maybe his craziness would be more prominent as time progressed, not that I was looking forward to it. He was crazy enough as it was. Near-deaths, while exhilarating, were not something I looked for in a battle. I had had enough of dying in the past; I didn't want to add any more to my list. Just that one time with the ripped wing was enough. And I certainly didn't plan to have "Larry "Solo Wing Pixy" Foulke; Dying repeating the stunt that got him his name" as my epitaph. Or any variation of that. Ever.

With a start, I realized that I didn't know Cipher's real name. Well, I know that his last name was Jackson. Otherwise, he wouldn't call himself 2nd Lieutenant Jackson. But what was his first name?

"What's wrong?" Cipher said, pulling me out of my thoughts. With embarrassment, I realized that I had been staring at him.

"Uhh… I never knew your name."

Cipher blinked at me a few times, as if he didn't believe what I said. And then he laughed. "You're seriously worried about that?" he asked in disbelief. Well, in all fairness, I guess I deserved that. "Well, in that case…"

He stood up and walked over to me, extending his hand out. "Allow me to introduce myself. 2nd Lieutenant A. Jackson."

I frowned as I shook his hand. I already knew that. Why wouldn't he tell me his first name. "2nd Lieutenant Larry Foulke. Nice to meet y- Wait. What should I call you? Jackson?" Don't get me wrong, but calling people by their last names sounded so formal. Only superior officers do that. Just look at Halo Squadron! You can use both hands to count how many times Robin had to remind the others to call with their callsigns, but you'd still lose your count.

"My friends used to call me Jack," Cipher answered. "So… Does that I mean I should call you Larry?"

I shrugged. "Up to you. But if you get to call me by my first name, then I get to call you by yours."

"Like I said, just call me Jack. Everyone does."

"Your first name, not a nickname made from your last name. What did the "A" stand for?"

Cipher sighed. "It stands for the letter "A"."

Seriously? His name must be that bad if he wouldn't tell it to me. "So… Archibald?"

"No."

"Azriel?'

"What kind of name is that?"

"Well, you won't tell me yours! So it's gotta be bad!"

"What have I gotten myself into…"

"Arizona?"

"You're not giving up are you?"

"Nope."

Cipher glared at me, and I glared back at him. The glaring contest continued until my eyes stung. Neither of us wanted to give up. But eventually, he blinked first.

"I win!" I said, whooping and fist-pumping. Call me childish, but I was really curious. Winning this might mean settling this matter once and for all.

"Fine, fine," Cipher grumbled. "If you don't get to call me by my first name, then I don't get to call you by yours."

Seriously? After all that? Now this? "Why are you so adamant about this?"

"Either way, I'm not backing down," Cipher said with a smirk.

"Then how the hell should we call ourselves, then? I'm not settling for last names."

"Why don't we just use our callsigns then? They're not half bad."

I sighed. A long argument, and still no progress on finding out about my flight lead's full name. It was like he had a phobia of it or something. Maybe it was really that bad. But I guess it could be worse. At least now I have a clue; the letter "A". I can settle for callsigns, as long as I get to guess what that letter "A" stands for. "All right," I said. "Callsigns it is, then."


	7. in-between 1b

When I walked into the mess at lunch, I expected to find Cipher. He wasn't in our room, and he'd left half an hour before lunch time. I figured that he would be there. It would really help if that was the case. I needed to show him the table where the Halo Squadron and Galm Team usually ate. It was common practice for squadrons to eat together at a table. Since Galm Team was paired with Halo Squadron for every mission thus far, we were practically a single unit.

So you could imagine my surprise when I saw that Cipher was nowhere to be seen.

"Have you guys seen Cipher?" I asked the squadron as soon as I sat down, thankfully without spilling anything in my food tray.

Scarlet frowned at me. "Shouldn't you be the one to know that? You're his roommate."

Rowdy laughed. "You're not only a bad wingman, Pixy. You're also a bad roommate."

"Newsflash," Lance chimed in. "Solo Wing Pixy is only good at flying solo."

"Not that surprising. His name has the word 'solo' in it."

"At least it's not Han Solo."

I groaned. It was impossible to talk to this group without getting derailed at least twice. "I'm serious, guys."

There was a sigh from behind me. I turned around, and saw that Robin was staring down at me. "If you must know," he said with a sigh, "your boyfriend took some food and left."

There were gasps of surprise and chokes of laughter at that remark. "He's not-" I began to say, before stopping to take a deep breath. It would do no good to play along. It would be like dousing a fire with fuel. "Never mind that. How are your donuts, Cap?"

Rowdy laughed outright, attracting stares from the tables surrounding ours. Robin sent the onlookers an apologetic look before returning to glare at me. If looks could kill… "They're doing just fine, thank you very much."

"Still can't believe that your stash is actually donuts," Lance grumbled. "What happened to keeping booze as a stash?"

Robin glared at him before cuffing him at the head. "We're on duty all the time, ya dimwit! It's war." He had a point. None of us had a chance of getting drunk and getting away with it. At least, not with Commander Ovechkin around. Nothing in this base happened without him knowing it. Sometimes I wondered if the guy had security cameras everywhere to keep an eye on us. Or maybe he had something else instead. I had no idea.

As Robin moved to sit down next to Scarlet, I noticed that he was carrying a small plastic bag. Once he sat, he placed said bag on the table and opened it. Guess what? It had DONUTS in it. We could only gape in surprise at the dessert before us. It wasn't that we never had donuts, it was just really hard to get them. It was war after all. "I figured I'd share with you guys," Robin said. "It's better than one of you going to steal my stash behind my back."

"How generous of you," Scarlet teased, grabbing a donut herself. The other guys wasted no time in doing the same thing, so I followed their example. There was no way I was letting them eating the last donut without me having a share. And it actually tasted good. It was chocolate.

Unexpectedly, there were two donuts left. Robin took one of them, so there was only one left. "Who's that one for?" Rowdy asked. From the way he was eyeing that donut, I knew that he wanted to get that last donut, too.

"Cipher," Robin answered, taking a bite out of his donut. "But since he's not here…"

Rowdy instantly made a motion to grab the donut, but Robin easily swatted his hand away. "This is for Cipher," he growled, pulling the bag (and the last donut inside) closer to himself so Rowdy couldn't reach it easily. "You're not Cipher. Back off."

"Funny it's you saving his donut and not Pixy," Lance commented. I groaned. Like I said, it was impossible to talk to them without getting derailed. All of them seemed hell-bent to target me with their chirps all the time.

"He's a bad roommate, like we said," Scarlet said.

"Only good at flying."

"Solo."

"I think he's a bad person overall," Robin said, joining in the fiasco. "Bad manners, bad roommate, bad wingman, bad-"

Luckily for me, I had just finished my lunch. "I'm done," I said, hastily standing up and walking away from them. "Better to keep as far away as I can from you lunatics."

Before I was out of earshot, however, Rowdy had time to chirp one less time at me. "Aww, you love us!" I ignored them.

Once I had placed my tray in the kitchen, I walked back to my room. Well, technically, it was our room now, since Cipher and I lived in it. To my surprise, there was no one there. I thought that Cipher was eating in the room, but he wasn't. And he couldn't have finished eating before me, because he didn't put any tray back. Unless he was eating without a tray? I mentally looked at the menu. There was a sandwich available. Maybe he took that. I looked at the trash can to see if there were any sandwich wrappers lying around, but there wasn't any.

Since it was confirmed that Cipher was not in the room, both before and after I walked in, I walked back out again. Usually, I didn't mind other people's business, but Cipher's intrigued me. I was also told by Malkin to keep an eye on him. Who knew? Maybe at this very moment, he could be trying to contact the enemy and spill all our identities to them.

It took me almost an hour to find him, and in that time, I've scoured the entire building twice before deciding to look in the hangars. Like someone once said, it was always in the last place you looked. Cipher was there, sitting on the wing of his plane and staring off at the mountains. Despite the admittedly mesmerizing view, I questioned his sanity. It was at least minus 20 degrees outside, and Cipher was only wearing a hoodie and a pair of shorts. If I didn't know any better, I'd say the idiot was trying to kill himself.

"Hey," I said as I walked next to the wing Cipher was sitting on. Cipher turned to me, allowing me to see what he was doing. Apparently, he was writing in a book. It didn't really add up, actually. He was using a pencil; nobody writes with a pencil. They write with a pen. People draw with-

He couldn't be drawing, could he?

"Hey," Cipher replied, placing the book down next to him. "What are you doing here?"

I shrugged as I climbed up the wing to join him. "You didn't show up for lunch." I pointedly glared at the few sandwich wrappers he had next to the book. He followed my gaze and smiled.

"I liked the view," he said. "I thought it wouldn't hurt to try and-"

"Don't worry. It's not mandatory to eat in the mess."

It was silent for a while after that. Both of us just stared at the mountains. I had to say it reminded me of Belka a little bit. The mountain ranges near my home was similar to the one Valais had. And if I remembered it correctly, Nostrand was actually pretty similar, too. A lot of the countries near Belka bore resemblance to the country in terms of the climate and surroundings. Cipher couldn't just be here for sightseeing. He had views just like this in his home country; he'd seen them every day, too. Surely there had to be another reason?

"You don't like crowds?" I asked, hoping to fish something out of him. Cipher turned to shoot a look at me. Bullseye.

"Uh… A bit. And the view's not half bad."

I snorted. "Nostrand had the same thing, didn't they?"

Cipher nodded. "Yeah. But much colder."

"Please tell me you didn't try this stunt back there, too?"

"A couple of times, actually."

I knew it. The kid was suicidal even when he was off-duty. Sometimes I wondered who was crazier; me or him. We were already nearly tied, and I was the one who had the experience advantage. Although, I wondered if he could top off my flying-with-only-one-wing thing. Surely no one would be crazy enough to replicate that.

"Besides," Cipher said, continuing, "I've never tried drawing anything else like this."

Drawing. I was right. Again. "You can do that?"

Instead of answering me, Cipher picked up the book and showed it to me. He wasn't actually lying. There it was, the sketch of the mountains surrounding Valais Air Base. It was actually pretty good. And now, I have yet another thing to add to my list of things that Cipher had that was similar to Blackhawk. Drawing was one of Blackhawk's hobbies. Well, it was his only hobby. He was good at it, although the way he drew was different than Cipher. Cipher's was more…realistic? I think that's the word for it. Blackhawk was more towards the cartoon side. It was actually he who created the Galm Team insignia.

"Whoa," I said, not bothering to hide my surprise. "You drew this?"

Cipher snorted. "Who else would? Casper?"

I frowned at him. "I didn't take you for a Casper fan." Because really, that movie was ridiculous.

"No, but a friend of mind is a – sorry, was – a fan."

"You have any drawings of Nostrand in there?"

"Some," Cipher said, closing the book and placing it down beside him. "I don't really want to talk about it."

While understandable, I wished he'd have said something. I couldn't help but feel a little guilty. My country had decimated his; they never took over it, they just killed the majority of people in it. I wondered if the fact I was Belkan made it uncomfortable for him to be fighting alongside me. I had no idea if it had or not. If it had, he made a damn good job at hiding it. A lot of the guys at Valais were wary of me at first, being Belkan and all. But most of them had changed. So much, that Valais were basically home now, especially since I'd refused to give Belka the title.

Who knew? Maybe I could stay here for the rest of my life.

_X_

There was a knock on my door. Again.

Second- No. Third time today.

But this time, it was recognizedly Richie's.

"Boys, briefing in five!" came the holler through the thin wooden object between us and the Major.

Playtime was over.

"Come on, Cipher," I said, hopping down from my bunk. "We've got a briefing to catch."

Cipher groaned as he stood up, sketch book left on the lower bunk. "I'd prefer if we have Belkans to shoot down." It was a moment before he caught himself, and muttered, "Sorry. I wasn't thinking."

"It's all right," I said with a shrug, already in the process of pulling on my flight suit. Cipher did the same, and for a few moments, both of us were silent. Only when we were out of our room did I dare to say something. "Does it ever bother you?"

"What?"

"The fact that I'm Belkan."

It only took a few moments for Cipher to answer. "No," he said. "You're fighting here. That's enough proof of whose side you're on. Besides, I don't really hate the Belkans that much."

Now THAT was surprising. A guy, whose home country was destroyed, held no grudge against the people that destroyed said home country? "Why don't you? You have that chance. No one can grudge you for it."

"I hate the government," Cipher explained. "The people in it…not so much. Back during the siege, the soldiers left more than a few survivors on purpose, most of them kids and families. They didn't like it any more than we do. They hate the fact that they have to kill so many people in such a cowardly way. But orders are orders; they still have to kill, even if they were actually selective about it. If anything, I feel bad for them."

I looked at him, surprised. He must've noticed because after that, he said, "Just imagine having the blood of all those people in your hands. That's not combat. That's murder. Nostrand wasn't the only victim in that ordeal. What about you? Why did you leave Belka?"

I was about to say to fight because of their attack, but Cipher cut me off. "And don't say it's because of what happened to Nostrand. I know for a fact that you've been a mercenary for far longer than that."

"Who's been telling stories?" I asked, not expecting him to answer. He did anyways. "Scarlet did," he said. "Also some of the people in the infirmary. A lot of them knew that I'm a merc from Nostrand. And more than a few speculated that I'd end up in Galm Team."

Smart people. It wasn't that hard to analyze, actually. Galm Team was the only mercenary team with an open slot. The others, with two or three fighters already in them, was packed to capacity. "Fine," I said in defeat. "I became a mercenary back in…'91, if I'm not mistaken. A friend of mine signed up for the Belkan Air Force. He was crazy good. And by crazy, I mean that it should've been impossible. He only had one arm."

At that, Cipher gaped at me. While it was surprising, it wasn't untrue. Well, except the small detail that Blackhawk was my brother, and not my friend. I grinned as I continued. "One arm, and he already beat me in combat several times already. But the Air Force didn't see that. All they saw was that one arm."

"He was rejected."

I sighed. "Yes, he was. Of course, I got angry. So both of us decided to just run. We became mercenaries. That Eagle of mine? I stole it from Grunder, and I've had it ever since I started as a merc."

"That's the same Eagle you landed with only one wing?"

Seriously, whoever had been telling stories about me had one very loose mouth. "Yeah. Did a lot of work to restore it because of that stunt."

Cipher opened his mouth, obviously about to say something else, but at the time, we'd arrived at the briefing room.


	8. in-between 1c

To think that we had a briefing just to be told that we needed to go on patrol…

Patrol missions were literally the most boring thing a mercenary pilot could be stuck with. Which was lucky, considering that it could've been tons and tons of paperworks (like the poor guys that were the Air Force pilots). These was one of the few occasions that I wished the Halo Squad were accompanying me. Arguing with them could really take the boredom out of these patrols (not that I would tell them that).

Too bad that I only had Cipher on the skies with me.

"Hey, Cipher," I said, deciding to break the radio silence. "How much longer do we have to be flying?"

"Until we have to get back?"

It would've been a lot more funny if we weren't the ones that were actually flying. "If having to go back means when we're out of fuel, I'd say we get back earlier than that," I said, hoping that after this, he'd actually answer me.

"Aren't you the one with the experience?" Well, so much for that.

I sighed. "If you prefer loitering around 'till your bird is out of juice, then be my guest, but don't drag me down with you, too." Mentally, I've counted the minimum amount of fuel I needed to get back safely. So far, it seemed that I still had a good deal of loitering around left before I had to go back. But when the time comes, I wouldn't wait around for Cipher to come back to his senses and follow me. If he refused to do so… I guess I'd have to drag his sorry tail back to base.

I bet the Halo Squad would get a good laugh out of that.

"Base Command to Galm Team," the Control Tower radioed in. Some ways in front of me, Cipher snapped out of his barrel roll and leveled his plane to the same altitude as mine. "An unknown aircraft is approaching airspace from vector 3-2-0. Intercept him for precautionary measures."

"Roger that," I radioed, heading over to the vector given by Base Command. I looked at my radar. That "unknown aircraft" was on the way of penetrating the restricted airspace around Valais Air Base. His trajectory was almost parallel to the airspace boundaries, so I doubted that its intentions were to directly come towards us. However, there were many times in the past that fighters used this trick to fool the enemy and attack them when they least expected it. There was no way I was going to let this one made a fool out of me.

I pulled up ahead of Cipher, temporarily assuming the role of flight lead. Cipher seemed okay with it, since he did not attempt to get back ahead of me. I had two purposes in doing this maneuver. One, with me seemingly the flight lead, the enemy would likely decide to not engage. Yes, there was only one plane, but radars could be fooled. Stealth planes had a way to slip past them, and there were a few models of stealth bombers already manufactured. I wasn't taking any chances. My Eagle, with the right wing painted red, was famous, even more so since I was a mercenary who had been to many countries. Landing a plane with only one wing was not an easy feat; doing so would make you the headlines of the mercenary community, and in extension, the Air Force community. While it might not be as intimidating as Schwarze, hopefully, it was enough.

Two, Cipher didn't look like a flight lead. No offense to the rookie, but his plane looked like a trainee's. No paint schemes, and it was obviously devoid of the kill count people normally recorded on the side of their planes. While I knew personally that Cipher had enough kill counts to be considered an ace, no one knew that. And no matter how skilled Cipher was, I wouldn't necessarily let him be the prime target of an entire enemy squadron just because he looks like the greenest pilot in the skies. Heaven knows how many times he got too close to death in that one mission.

With that said, it was me that met the enemy first, head on. It was of an unknown type to me; I had never seen it. It looked like it was enough to be a stealth. I looked at the radar to confirm that it was the same plane the Control Tower had reported. To my surprise, it was not; the other plane was still some ways away and was already fleeing from the airspace. No need to pursue that one, but we still had a problem in our hands. I looked back to stare at the plane. It was a stealth…

…and his companion just exited from the clouds above us for an ambush.

I barely had time to dodge before a rain of bullets riddled my aircraft's frame. With a curse, I rolled out of the way. The plane shot past me, attempting a loop to get back on my tail. Cipher, who was lower than both of us, had gone on to engage the first one.

The pilot I had pitted myself against was pretty good. His maneuvers were incredibly tight. It could very well be his aircraft. I had no idea what it was, and I had a pretty good knowledge of aircraft types. It must be a new type. I wondered if it was a secret weapon the Belka had been creating. Either way, it was time to find out.

"This is Galm Team from Ustio's 6th Air Division to two unknown fighters," I spoke over the radio using standard frequency. "State your intentions immediately, or you will be shot down. You are approaching restricted airspace."

Over the radio, I heard some static before someone yelled, "Whoa! Chuck, hold on! That's our allies!"

Allies?

"You're serious?" another voice said. The two planes immediately disengaged and separated themselves from us.

"Sorry, man," the first guy said. "Name's Rip, this is my partner Chuck. We're mercs from Osea. We're going to be paired with… Tiger Squadron?"

So these were the new guys Malkin was talking about? I understood why he disliked them. They were too brash. They attacked first and didn't stop to think that we were allies. Cipher and I weren't at fault; they made the first aggressive move. We were both on self-defense.

"Hey," one of them said. I thought it was Chuck. "Are you Solo Wing?"

Like I said, I was famous. There was the proof. "Just call me Pixy," I said. "This is my buddy, Cipher."

"Merc?" Rip asked.

I nodded before remembering that he couldn't see me. "Yeah," I answered.

There was a snort over the radio. "He looked like a nugget," Chuck commented. While it had some truth to it, it didn't lessen the sting caused by the comment. "He's not from Belka, is he?"

"Umm… No, actually," Cipher answered. "I…ummm…. I'm from Nostrand."

"I am the one from Belka," I answered as well.

That shut them up quick.

The silence that followed, although uncomfortable, was not unwelcome. I disliked them. The lack of respect was obvious. Even though mercenaries weren't as jam-packed with rules like the Air Force, we still had a code of respect. Cipher, although admittedly still a rookie and didn't seem to know the code that well, still held that respect. Sure, he might joked with me from time to time, but he never crossed the line.

Speaking of crossing lines…

"Galm Team to Base Command," I spoke over the radio, already switched over to Valais' frequency. "The bogey just ran away. But we had a run-in with two other unknown planes along the way."

"Are they hostile?"

"Negative," I answered, looking back at the two stealth planes and their obnoxious paint schemes. Seriously, who in their right mind would paint their plane bright green? "They're two mercenaries heading over to join Tiger Squadron. They called themselves Rip and Chuck. Is that right?"

There was a few moments' worth of silence before Ovechkin answered, "Affirmative. Escort them back to base. After that, your patrol is over. Great job, Galm Team."

"Roger. Pixy, over and out."

I didn't bother to relay the messages to Cipher, knowing that the chances were that he had already heard it. It was rather funny when you thought of it. Cipher was the official flight leader. But I was the one who was acting like a flight leader. I didn't blame Cipher. He was, technically, still a trainee. It would make sense if I was the flight lead for a while, at least until he was ready to fully take the role. I wondered whether or not the Base Commander knew that Cipher was a trainee.

_X_

"That is, legit, the worst paint job I've ever seen."

I turned to find Cipher standing behind me. We were both staring at the two new pilots' planes. I agreed with Cipher. Their paint jobs were the worst. The bright, almost neon green paint was unbearable to look at. While their planes were stealth, that paint made it practically scream "I'm here! Come and get me!" Because seriously, everyone could see their plane against the blue sky from a hundred miles away.

"Do you recognize the plane type?" I asked Cipher.

Unsurprisingly, my flight lead shook his head. "No idea. I've never seen it before."

I nodded in agreement. "It's definitely stealth. My radar caught zero traces of it."

"Are all mercenaries like that?"

I looked at him, unsure of what he had meant. "All of you have specialized paint jobs," Cipher clarified. "Some more flashy than others, but y'all have it. Why?"

He was right. "Well…" I began, not quite sure on how to explain it to Cipher. "We tend to do that. We don't know why, or since when it started, but it's like a… an accepted fact. Mercenaries have distinct paint jobs, to easily identify one another in combat. Besides, it's like your signature."

"Like yours?"

"Yeah," I said with a nod. "My red wing. Solo Wing Pixy, remember?"

Cipher grumbled. "How can I forget? You have a fan in the infirmary, you know? She never stops talking about you and how good you are." Well, that was a new fact. One that I'd rather not know.

Looking towards his own plane, Cipher asked, "So I need to have one too, huh?"

"Preferably," I answered, heading over his plane. "It's not necessary. But hey, plain grey's a bit boring."

"I can't deny that," Cipher laughed. And then he went silent, seemingly thinking hard. "I think I have an idea…"

I grinned. The rookie was pretty quick on the uptake. "Need my help applying the paint?"

Cipher looked at the plane again before grimacing. "I think so. But that won't put you off though?"

"None whatsoever," I assured him, already moving towards the cupboards where the mechanics used to keep the paints. "Besides, I'd like to hear this idea of yours."

I opened the cupboard, surveying the contents. There wasn't much. With a lot of planes (and mercenaries) coming and going, the paint seemed to be used often. And with the arrival of the two new mercenaries, I doubted that what was left in the cupboards wouldn't last long. "I hope you don't need green," I said. "We're out of it."

"Actually," Cipher said, moving to the cupboard and standing beside me. "I only need two colors; blue and grey."

I frowned. That was…simple. "Same shade of grey?"

Cipher nodded. "Yeah. Oh. And I'd probably need the red, purple and white, too. I mean, seeing as how I'm a part of Galm Team…"

I understood immediately. He wanted to have the insignia on his rudders. "All here," I said, handing out the three buckets. They were the exact same shade with the insignia I had on my plane. I'd know because I was the one who helped applying it all those years ago. It wasn't easy. Blackhawk had wanted to paint the entirety of our insignia to the rudders, while I had argued that it was too detailed and that such insignias were best reserved for uniform patches. Finally, we settled on drawing the image of the hellhound. It had worked ever since.

"Great," Cipher said with a grin. "Now, all I need is the blue-"

"Here," I said, pulling out a bucket of blue paint. Cipher took one look at it and shook his head. "Not this one," he said. He looked at the other cans available and pulled out one of them. "This one." It was a much darker shade of blue than the one I'd picked. It was probably navy blue.

"Great," I laughed. Taking out the grey can (which I swore was the exact same shade as Cipher's plane), I walked towards the plane. "Let's begin."

To make a paint scheme on your plane was a delicate process. While it wasn't that hard, if you were sloppy in doing so, you'd get a really, really bad paint scheme. Or, in the other hand, if your techniques weren't sloppy and you just had really bad taste in art, you'd get what those Green Freaks had for their planes.

Since both of us had a lot of surface to cover, I assigned Cipher to apply the grey paint where he wanted them. The Eagle, which I thought was the same one that Cipher used to escape from Nostrand, had been shot up on many occasions recently, most of them on account of everyone wanting to kill him. So, while the actual holes were already fixed, there were marks of the repair. Those "marks" stood in stark contrast against the plane's lighter shade, making it look a bit like a snow leopard with those greyish spots. The grey paint was useful in covering those. Meanwhile, I focused on the task of painting the insignia. Since I had done it with Blackhawk's plane and mine, I might as well do it again. While it was trickier than just covering up marks, I still enjoyed it.

It took a couple of hours for us to finish that plane. And when it was finished, I had to say that Cipher's idea wasn't half bad. In the end, all we did was cover up the bullet marks and paint the control surfaces blue. Cipher had painted the wings, rudders and elevators with the triangular blue. It reminded me of something, but I couldn't put my finger on it.

"It's great, buddy," I said to him, grinning. Cipher grinned back. "Yeah. It is."

"Does it mean something?"

Cipher looked at me, silent for a few moments. "Yeah," he nodded. Before I had a chance to ask what it actually meant, a bell rang clear through the base. Dinnertime. And hell if I let Cipher get away from eating with Halo Squad like last time.


	9. in-between 1d

Dinner wasn't very interesting. The menu didn't change (it never did). A few tuna sandwiches. Pizza. Mac and Cheese. Y'know, all those frozen foods that only needed to be microwaved to be eaten? Those kind of stuff. It wasn't all that appetizing. But it was food, so I wouldn't refuse.

As we headed over to the table with our trays, Rowdy greeted us on the way, also carrying a tray of his own. "Why, there's the little lost lamb. Where were you last time?"

Cipher blushed a bit at that. "I was…umm…looking around the base," he said, not sounding truly convincing. "Maybe I can find some secret stashes."

"Tell me if you find any," Rowdy laughed. "Although, if you find any that belongs to Tiger Squad, please, for the sake of your life, don't take it." I could relate to that. Malkin was scary when he was angry. Ovechkin, too, for that matter. Maybe it was just a Yuktobanian thing.

"Ya betcha," Cipher said, grinning. But then, he frowned. "But how do I know if it's Tiger Squad's?"

Rowdy paused, looking a bit thoughtful. That was a really good question, though. It wasn't like anyone would mark their stash around here. So far, I hadn't found any, so I had no idea if that was actually the case.

"You'll have an angry Yuktobanian coming after you," Rowdy said after a while. He laughed. "So I think it's better not to take any stash at all."

"I thought it's easier to ask for forgiveness than permission?"

"That rule doesn't apply to Yukes. And I value my life. If you and your psycho nature can't deal with that, don't take anyone down with you."

Cipher actually gaped when Rowdy said that, and I just laughed at his expression. "You really think I'm suicidal?" Cipher asked. If you ask me, I say he didn't look like he really wanted to know.

Rowdy snorted. "Everyone knows that. Who the fuck in their right mind would try to handle a patrol flight of Belkans all on their own?"

"Your flight was too slow," Cipher retorted. "I would've died if I waited for help."

"Then use that fancy training of yours. Evade like hell. Not plunge head in into the fray. Showoff." Even as he said this, Rowdy was grinning. He still was grinning when we all walked to our table.

"Hey, it's the new guy!" Lance greeted us when we sat down. "And the worst wingman ever."

I groaned. "Won't you lay off of it for one day, guys?"

"Nope," Rowdy nodded seriously. He had this glint in his eye which I DID NOT like in any way. Usually it meant bad things were coming your way. "We like giving you hell. So far, you haven't given us enough reason not to do so."

"We won't let this one go," Scarlet chimed in, grinning like a goddamn cheshire cat.

"Never ever."

Robin looked at all his squadmates, glaring murderously at them. I shuddered, even though he wasn't aiming it at me. Seriously. That guy could be scarier than a Yuke when he wanted to be. "Guys. I'll say it, and I won't say it again. Lay off of Pixy. I mean it. Understand?" Although he didn't outright say "Do otherwise and I'll get your hides," the threat wasn't lost on all of us.

Lance looked crestfallen. "Aye-aye, Cap."

"Yes, Cap," Scarlet said, meticulously studying the plate of Mac and Cheese in front of her.

"Crystal clear," Rowdy said, not quite hiding his pout. I would've laughed at his childishness, but at that exact second, someone walked close to our table. I didn't really know what happened. But the next thing I knew, I had a plate of tuna sandwich thrown to my face, and the guy was lying face-down on the floor.

It took me less than a second to realize that the guy had tripped and the tuna sandwich in his hand had decided to use my face as target practice.

What is it with me and Lady Luck these days?

To my right, I heard someone giggling.

It was Scarlet.

"You think this is funny?" I asked her. I tried to keep looking serious, but still, I found myself grinning.

Scarlet nodded. "Yes."

I grinned more and more as I grabbed for a tuna sandwich in Cipher's plate. "Then this must be funny as well."

I was already about to throw the food at her in retaliation when suddenly…

"What's going on here?"

I froze. Then, very slowly, I turned to the doorway. Right there, stood Alexander Ovechkin. The freaking Base Commander.

Cipher laughed quietly beside me. I would've smacked him for that (the traitor) if I didn't have the undivided attention of a Base Commander aimed at me. "Uhh… Commander," I said. For the first time since I got to the base, I felt nervous.

"Is there something wrong?"

"No, Commander," I said brusquely. "Not at all."

Ovechkin nodded, seemingly satisfied at my reply. "So why don't you go change? You look like an 11-year-old after a food fight."

Trying my best to ignore Cipher (who was desperately trying to keep himself from laughing outright), I nodded at Ovechkin and headed straight for the showers.

Damn my luck.

_X_

"Hey, Larry!"

Turning around, I saw Sebastian, waving at me from where he was perched on the rocks. I grinned, running towards him. "What is it, Seb?"

He pointed towards the valley below us. I looked. It was amazing. The sheer drop from the edge of the cliff to the shallow river below us was breathtaking. I felt like I could just fall down and spread my wings and fly.

Not that I'd do that, though. I'm smart enough to know I'd be dead if I ever tried that.

"It's beautiful, Seb," I commented instead. I pulled out my camera, taking a picture of the entire thing. It was too good to miss. "Maybe I'll win something with this. This is so good."

Seb grabbed towards the camera, obviously wanting to take a look at the picture. "Lemme see! Lemme see!"

I pulled the camera away from him, using my other hand to hold him back. "Come and get it!"

Seb flailed his arm, trying (and failing) to get at me. "I'll get it, Larry! I'll get-

*CRASH*

I woke up, not exactly knowing what caused me to wake up. It wasn't a bad dream. And I knew for sure that I didn't have to go to a briefing in… what? 2 a.m.?

It was quite a while before I heard the sound of someone tossing and turning, the kind you get when you're thrashing about in your sleep.

Cipher.

I peeked over my bed. And sure enough, I saw Cipher on the bunk underneath mine. As I suspected, he was restless, struggling against something invisible. "Cipher," I whispered. No response. His movements was more erratic now, and I winced when his foot struck one of the bedposts. That must hurt.

Another kick at the post. "Cipher!" I said again, louder this time. "It's just a dream. Wake up!" Cipher stilled for a moment. I tensed, hoping that it was over. When a few seconds had passed and nothing else happened, I relaxed and laid back down on my bed. Maybe I could still get a few more hours of sleep.

What do those Oseans usually say? Oh, yeah. Don't ask, don't tell.

_X_

When I woke up a few hours later (around 7, I think), Cipher's bed was empty. It wasn't that surprising. The man probably wanted a walk or something. Walks usually help me when I have nightmares.

Jumping down from the top bunk, I grabbed my coat and walked out. The air was a bit warmer than yesterday. Maybe we would have a sunny day at last, though I doubted that. Ustio wasn't exactly known for white-sand beaches and tropical setting after all. As far as I could tell it was snow, snow, snow all day.

Just like Belka.

And Nostrand.

I stopped, suddenly remembering something. I probably wasn't too familiar with Nostrand, but I did remember learning about the country as a kid. You know, the teachers at school thought it was a really good idea to force the students to memorize every single country that bordered yours and to learn everything you could know about it. Naturally, I had to learn it. The one thing I really remembered until I was grown-up was the flags of those countries. Nostrand's was one of my favourites. It was all blue and white with an insignia on the middle…

Oh, shit.

It wasn't long before I reached the base's Database Room. It was even less time before I asked one of the database technicians to pull up the files they have about Nostrand.

"Nostrand?" the woman had looked at me, clearly surprised. "Why would you open the file for that?"

I smiled at her. "Nothing much. I got some hunch, and I just wanna see if I'm right."

"All right, then." She still seemed hesitant, but at least she was already giving me the folder. And damn, that folder is really thick! Most of them is probably about the invasion. "Don't lose it, and don't forget to return it. I'd hate to print it again."

I nodded my thanks, and was gone in seconds. Once outside, I opened the damned folder. And there it was, right in the front page, printed in full color for the whole world to see.

The flag of Nostrand…

It was just as I remembered. Blue background. White triangle at the center, with a fleur-de-lis at the middle of said white triangle. I mentally compared it to the wings of Cipher's Eagle. It was a perfect match as far as I was concerned.

_X_

When I finally met Cipher at around noon, he was joking around with the rest of the Halo Squadron in the mess.

"Pixy!" Robin shouted the moment he saw me as I walked in. "We're having a game of UNO! Care to join us?"

Rowdy, who was sitting on Robin's right, placed a card on an ever growing pile of cards at the center of the table. I noticed that it was black with…4 different-colored bars in the middle? And a +4? What the heck is this game? "Don't fall for it, Pixy," he said with a grin. "He just wanted you to join so he won't be the only loser in this group."

Robin glared at him. "That's bullshit. I need another grown-up to help me watch the four of you. 'Tis too great a task for a man!"

"It's your turn," Lance pointed out, poking Robin's arm. "And stop that posh language!"

Robin looked at the pile of cards. As soon as he did, though, he groaned in annoyance.

"Why?" I looked again at the card. I had no idea what it meant, and why it would cause Robin to look like he was dying. "What does it mean?"

"Don't tell me you never played UNO?" Cipher asked. He was looking at me, downright surprised.

I shrugged. "I don't know. Should I have? And what does that card mean? Gil looks like he's dying right now."

"It means I should take four new cards," he said, at the same time drawing four cards from a different pile. I noticed that the pile was a lot shorter than the previous one, and that Robin had a lot of cards in his hands. "Which, of course, means I have four more cards between me and the finish line."

Scarlet laughed, placing a card on the pile. "Stop using your attack cards early, moron!"

"Watch who you're calling a moron, Scarlet," Robin warned. If looks could kill, Robin's would do the job well and more than that. "I'm still you're flight leader."

"Doesn't mean they should let you win." Cipher placed a new card on the table. It had two arrows on it. "Your turn again, Scarlet."

Wait, what? I thought Scarlet just made a move. How was it her turn? Shouldn't it be Lance's? "Why does Scarlet get two moves?"

Lance just shot a look at me, clearly unimpressed. "Cipher, from now on, it's your job to educate Pixy on the remarkable game of UNO. The Neanderthal's obviously lived under a rock this whole stinking time."

Cipher's "gotcha" was inevitably drowned out by me protesting. "We're the same species," I reasoned. "Some Sentient-thingamajig."

Scarlet placed another card at the table. "Homo Sapiens."

"Yeah, that." I sat down on the vacant spot between Robin and Rowdy. "And this is a weird game. Try poker. It's better."

Rowdy laughed outright at that one. "Poker's for gramps, Pix. I expect this from Robin, not you."

The only response from the Halo flight leader was a middle finger.

_X_

Halfway through watching the guys play UNO the second time, I still don't see why it's a fun game. I mean, the rules are crazy! Well, it is different, and it is interesting. But still, anyone who've shuffled the deck prior to the game can rig the cards so that they'll get the good ones. For example, any one of the cards that doesn't have a number. And all of them with the plus signs.

Proof? Rowdy had shuffled this deck, and he got the +4 card and so much more attack cards. I could see it clear as day; I was sitting behind him.

"Hello, fellas."

I turned to see who was talking, and I grimaced. I didn't recognize them, but the bright green insignia on their flight suits clued me in.

One of the green freaks.

"What are you guys doing?" the taller one asked. I took a glance of the name tag and it read "C. Murphy". My guess is he's Chuck, and the other guy's Rip.

"Uhh… We're playing UNO," Lance answered, looking up at the newcomers. He had a funny look on his face. "Um, who are you guys? We've never seen you around."

Chuck grinned. "Oh, I'm Chuck and he's Rip. We're the Green Hornets."

Out of nowhere, Rowdy laughed out loud. I shot a look at him to try and warn him. I've seen mercs like those two, and usually, they never liked anything from other people that isn't respect and obedience. Laughing at them is NOT an action I would ever suggest. "What's so funny?" Rip growled.

"You guys name your team after a comic book character?" Rowdy gasped out, still laughing. I would've kicked his leg if I could, but him being in front of me and me being out from under the table meant that the green freaks would surely see what I did.

Chuck scowled, his arms crossed. "No, we didn't."

Rowdy flashed a grin at the two. He's stopped laughing (finally!) and was definitely getting a kick out of the name. The Green Hornets. "Well sorry, boys, but the name's patented. That's copyrighted material."

"Yeah, right." Chuck rolled his eyes, not caring if Rowdy saw it or not. "That's still our name, and we're still using it."

Lance looked a bit thoughtful. "What if they sued, though?"

"Huh?"

"Lawsuit," Lance clarified. "You do know what they mean, right?"

"Of course we do!" Rip looked downright pissed right now. I was beginning to get worried. Things could get ugly. "What do you take us for? Morons?"

Cipher shot a look at the two pilots, face blank. "The Green Hornets, right?" Chuck nodded. "Then you're in the clear. The comic book character is the Green Hornet."

Lance looked at Cipher, frowning. "But they're the same!"

"Not really," Rowdy said, deciding to help Cipher. I watched the Green Hornets as the conversation go on. They seemed to be a bit calmer now. "One has an s, the other doesn't."

Scarlet laughed. "And one's singular, the other's plural. Where did you learn your grammar, Lance?"

"Shut up," Lance snapped, face red. "Okay, so I was wrong. Sorry. Now let's forget about it, okay?"

Grinning, I decided to jump in. "Aww… who invited the grumpy cat here?"

"More like Red Riding Hood," Robin said, shuffling his cards around. "He's so red right now."

"Fuck you!"

None of us noticed the Green Hornets slipping away until the game finally ended. But hey, it's not like they'll be missed.


	10. annex (part I)

Operation: Roselein

1020hrs. 15 April 1995

Arlon

The next mission briefing was earlier than before, but I wasn't even close to annoyed. It was nowhere near early enough that I had to drag myself out of bed earlier than usual. In fact, I was pretty grateful for it. The past few days had been boring as hell. I mean, come on! We've literally spent the last week on patrols!

Still, it didn't mean that Cipher and I weren't late for briefing. It was all his fault. He'd deny it, but he's the one who decided to stay up late _sketching_ and then woke up late as a result.

That bastard would get me killed if the look the Base Commander gave us was any indication.

"We must regain control over Route 171, which runs through Arlon, to secure a transit route for our ground troops," the Commander said to begin the briefing. At the same time, the projector turned on, displaying an area that I suspected was Arlon. Right through it was a route; Route 171. "There are bridges along this route, three over the Aare River. All heavily guarded by the Belkan Armored Corps."

No kidding, Commander. I could already see all the tanks from the surveillance photos displayed. There's a whole bunch of 'em. The tanks I knew I could handle. The SAMs... Those little bastards were created to make the lives of us pilots a literal living hell. Try and take a guess how I feel about it.

"Securing this route is critical to Ustio's attack on the Belkan Forces." No shit. After all, if you can't cut his head off, might as well choke the monster 'till he die. "Destroy the Belkan ground units blocking passage along this route and secure this supply line between our forces and the Osean Army."

Did he just say _Osean_ Army?

Maybe the so-called Allied Forces are really happening?

I couldn't think long because the rest of the fighter pilots were already gone to the hangar to get in their planes. Only Cipher waited for me.

As I walked to him, he grinned. "Must've been an important mission to make you space out thinking on it like that."

I punched him in the arm lightly, grinning right back. "Asshole. I was just wondering about the Allied Forces."

Cipher frowned. "Allied Forces? What do they have to do with this mission?"

" _Osean_ Army, ya nitwit."

"Still don't see the connection."

I glared at him. He couldn't be that oblivious. "Whenever there are two armies working together, like us and the Osean in this mission, it's called an Allied Force."

"I get that. But the Oseans aren't actually fighting right now. For all we know, we're just securing them a route so that they can freely come in and out to buy Ustio's butterbeer or something."

He's hopeless, and I've given up. Not caring about what my weird flight lead is doing anymore, I climbed into my airplane and hopped in, strapping the helmet on while mentally running down the check procedures. "Galm 2 ready to go," I said once I've finished. The hangar doors had already opened up and I was already rolling out of the hangar, right behind Cipher. "Permission to take off?"

"Permission granted," came the reply from Base Command. "Galm 1, you are cleared for takeoff."

"10-4, Base Command," Cipher acknowledged. His plane took off less than a minute later.

"Galm 2, you are cleared for takeoff."

"Roger that."

Takeoff is always amazing, no matter how many times you do it. You feel like you're suddenly free; free of the ground and free to roam the sky as you please. Or in our case, to rain hell to the enemies.

"Galm 1 and 2, altitude restrictions canceled. Return to your mission. Good luck."

And that's our cue.

_X_

Arlon, I decided, is a beautiful place.

The green fields. The trees. The windmills.

It's almost like what I imagine a dream home would be like.

Too bad that the war's going to change it like it did to so many other places.

"This is AWACS Eagle Eye to Galm." _Huh? I didn't know we had an AWACS with us..._ I looked up, and there he was. High, high up above us was an E-3 Sentry. "The target is in formation along the highway. Commence the operation."

"Keep an eye on us up there, AWACS," I spoke through the radio. I didn't want any of us to crash and the rest to not know about it. We've got to keep an eye on each other's backs.

There was a laugh over the radio. "More specifically, keep an eye on Mr. Solo Wing." Cipher. "Don't want him turning to No Wing Pixy."

My protests were unfortunately drowned out by Rowdy's ( _of course_ it was Rowdy) laughter. "Whoa. Shots fired."

"Will do, Galm 1," AWACS replied, also laughing. I couldn't believe that everyone was ganging up against me.

And to think that what I did was considered impossible. Only pilot to pull that off in history, and I still got shit for it. "At least I didn't crash, did I?"

"Nope," Cipher laughed. "But you're just crazy enough to even _think_ of landing an Eagle with one wing."

"You would too, y'know? These planes are expensive. You'd go broke buying one of these."

"That's why it's better to sneak into the enemy base and steal one of theirs."

"Whoa!" Scarlet shouted. "Someone's got their morality askew." The sound of her voice was a bit laden with static. It wasn't really a surprise considering that the Halo Squadron is running a bit late. No surprise _there_.

"All's fair in love and war and all that," Cipher shot back.

I grinned. "Hey, my idea worked. I got my plane back and I didn't need to sacrifice my morality."

"Like you actually have one of those."

"Well, what I have seems to be more than what you really h-"

"Cut it out, you two," Eagle Eye interjected. His interruption brought me back to the route in front of us. Damn, I hadn't realized that it was already so close. Ten more seconds and we'd probably blown past it. "Belkan ground forces are blocking off our transport route. Destroy them all."

From the corner of my eye, I saw Cipher speeding ahead of me, flying right above Route 171. "Roger that, Eagle Eye. Galm 1, engaging."

Within no time, Cipher was far ahead of me. It would take a lot of speed for me to catch up. By then, he had probably destroyed half the targets there. The kid's wicked like that. "Galm 2, engaging."

Through the static of the radio, I heard Robin's voice break through. "Halo Squad, show those Belkan fighters what we're made of."

"Fox 2! Fox 2!"

Seemed like they got tangled with a couple of fighters. But at least they were _finally_ somewhere near Arlon. "Oh, look who's finally here. Did your carriage break down on the way, princess?"

"Shut it, Galm 2." Lance. He sounded really grumpy.

"I suggest you do what Lance said, Pixy." Scarlet. Always the peacekeeper. When she's not in prankster mode, that is. "He's in a fucked up mood right now."

"Language," Robin reminded her. As if he wasn't enough of an old geezer, he had to act like one, too.

An AA gun came into view. With my gun, I finished it off quickly, not bothering to report the kill. One, it's just an AA gun. Two, Halo Squadron's rambles is too much fun; it'd be a shame to interrupt them. Three, I'm a mercenary. I don't have to follow the rules word by word all the time.

Rowdy laughed. "Yeah, Scarlet. Language. I thought you're supposed to be the polite lady here."

"Stop stereotyping everyone," Scarlet admonished. "Fox 2!" A pause. "Bagged 'em."

Good ol' Scarlet. Never misses her targets. Speaking of targets... There was an APC right in front of me just begging for me to kill it. Naturally, I did. "Dropping. ... Right on target."

I was just about to demolish a tank when an unfamiliar voice came through the radio. "Did those fighters come here from Ustio?" I couldn't recognize it. The accent was Belkan, but why were they speaking English?

"Was that the enemy?" Logically, it would be them, seeing that I hadn't spoken and none of my teammates were Belkan.

"Who else would it be?" Cipher answered. I looked to where he was flying. He was far ahead of me, and currently engaging in a dogfight with a Belkan fighter. He looked like he was winning, so I didn't bother to help him. Why should I? The kid practically held his ground against seven fighters while running to Ustio. He'll be just fine.

"It could be Lance," Rowdy offered. I didn't think Lance would appreciate whatever Rowdy would say next, because usually it wasn't nice, but I didn't comment. "He had his moments."

Just as I suspected, Lance reacted none too kindly. "HEY! Fuck you, Rowdy."

"LANGUAGE!"

"They must be in a desperate situation." It was the enemy. How in hell could we hear each other like this? Strategies would be revealed all over the frequency to all sides if this was the case. "But there's no way we're giving up this place."

" _'They must be in a desperate situation,'_ " Scarlet quoted. "They must've thought we're crazy after hearing our radio chatter."

Rowdy laughed. "Seems so, _babe_."

Uh-oh. Bad move, Rowdy...

"Scarlet. Rowdy." Robin didn't sound pleased at all. In fact, he sounded just like a drill sergeant about to explode. Key word there; about to. "Is there something I should know?"

"Uh... No, sir!" Judging from Rowdy's tone of voice, I bet that he must've realized this, too. "There's nothing going on here, Captain, sir!"

"Hey, if we can hear them, they should be able to hear us, right?" I frowned. I couldn't see why Cipher would change the subject so suddenly like that. There's no connection between Rowdy and Scarlet probably in a relationship with the fact that the Belkans can-

Oh.

He's trying to distract Robin from going all wrath-of-God mode. "Cipher, don't you dare change the sub-"

"I dunno, Cipher." Considering he's my flight lead, I might as well get on with the program. Hopefully by the end of the day, Robin wouldn't remember this and try to get back at us all. "Why do you ask?"

"We can piss them off. Big time." Of course my flight lead would think of something that crazy.

"So you'd go ahead and give them more reason to kill you?" Lance sounded incredulous, and I couldn't blame him.

Rowdy laughed. It sounded strained, but still believable. "I know you're still a rookie, and you're from Nostrand, but don't you think that's a bit suicidal, even by your crazy standards?"

"Why not? It's fun."

I laughed. Fun, he said. I knew exactly one thing in this mission that can make things absolutely nowhere near fun. "I'll believe it when you say that with a SAM locked onto you."

"You'll hear it. Twice."

"Don't get cocky, buddy."

"Said the cockiest man alive."

"Pixy, Cipher!" Uh-oh. It's Eagle Eye. "Knock it off and focus!"

Cipher still laughed, which wasn't that surprising. Everyone knew how suicidal he was. Only he would laugh while being threatened by an AWACS, which, in comparison, was about ten times worse than Robin when they're berserk.

"Halo Squad, are they usually like this?"

Rowdy snickered. "No, sir. Usually, it's way worse."

"Last time," Lance said, "they almost started a food fight in the mess."

I felt my face heating up at that. I could still remember the incident. I almost hit Scarlet with a sandwich before Commander Ovechkin walked in. "It was just one time, fellas! Geez. What happened to 'forgive and forget'?"

"Hey!" Cipher protested. "I had NO part in that! It was all Pixy!"

"All I have to say is this. They're both crazy." Oh, that's IT, Rowdy. I'd make damn sure that you'd get yourself a plateful of pranks tomorrow. Or after this mission is over. I guarantee it.

"Perfect pair, huh? Duly noted, Halo Squad."

Dang. Now even our AWACS thinks we're crazy. Bound to happen, I guess.

A pair of AA guns came into my sight. While they weren't as deadly as SAMs, they're still little pesky bastards that won't stop at anything to destroy us. So it'd make sense if we return the sentiment. "Dropping, dropping." A couple of bombs, and the AA guns were no more. "Target hit."

"Hold them off! Don't let them get this place!" Ah, those arrogant Belkans. Apparently they haven't heard of Galm Team and the Halo Squadron. Even if we lose, we still take a lot of those guys down with us.

"This route is Ustio's lifeline. I'll get it back."

"WE will get it back," Cipher said. I looked to where I thought he would be, but he was no longer in front of me. I looked at the radar. Somehow, he'd gotten himself somewhere behind me, apparently circling around a Belkan tank that wouldn't blow up. "There's no way I'm letting you get all those targets."

Rookies. All bark and no bite. "Really? Catch up if you can, rook."

"I'm trying! You're so damn fast, y'know that?"

Two APCs ahead of me. No big deal. Nothing a bomb wouldn't fix. "Just like I destroyed those two APCs over there?"

"There!" Cipher shouted. I looked back again. That tank was finally destroyed. "Take that, sucker!"

"Tank destroyed," Eagle Eye said. "Keep it up, everyone."

At long last, Cipher overtook me and got ahead of me. I took a quick glance at his ammo, and what I saw shocked me. Cipher had already used four of his eight bombs, and yet he'd only destroyed so few targets. Was he that bad a shot? Looking at how he just missed an AA gun by a big deal, I think that was the case.

"I hate ground targets," he grumbled.

"Try again." I watched him turn around, taking another shot at the AA gun. Yet again, he missed. Another bomb wasted. Even the rookie mercenaries I knew of weren't this bad. Unless... "Did you finish your ground attack training?"

No answer.

"God help us all," I muttered. I looked at the radar. There were quite a flock of Belkan fighters heading our way. They'd trouble us in no time if no one dealt with them. "Cipher, just focus on the air targets. There's a couple heading our way from the North. I'll handle the ground."

"Roger that, Pixy."

"Eagle Eye, can you give Cipher directions to the fighters? Don't want him getting lost."

There was a laugh from the AWACS and a muttered "Fuck you" from Cipher. "I got it covered," Eagle Eye said. "Galm 1, head to 2-7-0. There's a flight of three aircraft - probably MiG-21s - heading our way from that direction."

"10-4, Eagle Eye."

With the rookie taken care of, I focused back on the targets that I still have waiting to be destroyed. A couple of AA guns here, a tank there, and-

"Warning, enemy plane overhead!"

Did the Belkans really just realized we're here _now_? I thought they were faster. I remembered that they were faster when I enlisted in the Academy before I dropped out with Blackhawk.

What changed?


	11. annex (part II)

"Does anybody know of a way to shut them up?" Robin growled. "The enemy's a chatterbox."

"Can't be worse than we are, Gil," Scarlet interjected.

"Callsigns, Scarlet. Callsigns. Use them. They exist for a reason."

"Hey, the chatterboxes from Halo Squad," I greeted them. I had to stop them somehow. They were beginning to hurt my ears. "Stop talking and start shooting! What took you guys so long?"

"Belkans are good fighters, y'know?" Rowdy said, his plane dropping to around my level so that he was in front of me. "Hard to kill 'em. Plus, Lance took 15 minutes to talk to his girlfriend through the radio."

"Watch it, Rowdy," Lance threatened. "I'm behind you with armed weapons." An empty threat, I realiazed, since Lance was nowhere behind Rowdy. I was the one behind him.

Maybe Lance had gone bonkers and was hallucinating about being behind Rowdy. "Don't go crazy, now. We still have a transport route to take."

"Then tell Rowdy to stop," he half-shouted through the radio. As if my ears hadn't already gotten enough abuse. "He's driving me nuts."

"Rowdy. Shut up," I told him. Hopefully if I settled their argument, they'd just stop talking.

Rowdy scoffed. "As if you can make me do that."

Oh-ho-ho... He's really asking for trouble now. "Wanna bet?" Moving my plane so that I was _really_ behind him, I pretended lining up for a shot. Not that I'd do that, though. My Eagle's targeting computer didn't recognize Rowdy as an enemy. There was no way I could lock on to him. The only way I could shoot him – not that I wanted to – would be with my guns.

"Ease off there, Galm 2!" Robin sounded panicked. Was he actually convinced that I'd shoot Rowdy? "That's my squadron you're going to shoot at."

"You really thought I'd actually shoot him? Ye of little faith."

"Guys, keep it together," Scarlet warned.

"Scarlet's right," Robin said. His plane pulled up on top of me, apparently looking for air targets. Seeing as I'd sent Cipher to take care of them earlier, I doubted that there'd be any of them left. "There's no way to finish this mission if we keep bickering like five-year-olds. Galm Team, you guys handle the air targets. Feel free to engage ground targets when possible. The Halos are going air-to-ground."

Sounds like a solid plan to me. "Roger that, Halo 1. Galm 2, focusing on air targets."

"Galm 1. Uhh... What he said."

"Real charming, Galm 1," Lance chuckled. I couldn't help but agree with him.

"Shut up," Cipher snapped.

I was about to say something when there was a crackle over the radio. "He hit me." Belkan. "Preparing to disengage."

I scanned the sky, looking for any damaged airplane that was flying out of the battlezone. It wasn't too long before I spotted it; an F-4E with smoke billowing out of one of its engines. And seeing as the friendly plane closest to the crippled plane was Cipher's...

It was safe to assume that he was the one who took it down. "This is Galm 1, I'm switching back to ground targets."

Was he nuts? "Cipher, I thought you didn't f-"

"Well," Cipher drawled out, "Robin said to feel free to engage ground targets when possible. And right now, I have an AA gun that pisses me off."

If that's the case... "Then what are you waiting for?"

"Aye-aye, sir."

"Just don't miss. Like that AA gun earlier."

"Hey, it's not my fault I didn't complete my train- Dropping."

I could hear the faintest sound of an explosion through the radio. Too faint for it to be sign of any trouble, though.

"Target destroyed," Eagle Eye announced.

"Wait, wait, hold on a sec," Rowdy said. "Cipher really didn't complete his training?"

There was laugh. Probably Cipher. "I think we've just established that." Definitely Cipher.

"Let me guess," Robin drawled out. "Ground attack?"

"Well, duh."

I grinned, taking in the new stretch of highway we just entered. It was peppered with targets.

Perfect place for ground attack training. "Hey, Cipher. See that? Try to follow my lead, okay?"

"But I just nailed an AA gun." Was he actually whining?

"Was it skill or luck?"

"Well..."

"Then come on. There's still a couple of targets left along the highway." Hell if I have to drag this whining rookie all through this mission. The first target we met was a tank. It didn't take long for me to drop a bomb on it. It took less longer for it to explode.

"Tank destroyed." Just count on Eagle Eye to report battle damages like that. It's pretty useful despite what you may think. It keeps us from accidentally bombing the wrong target, e.g. a civilian house. Not that we'd ever do that of course. Hopefully.

I looked at Cipher. His plane was behind mine, a bit far back so as to avoid the jetwash. "Wasn't that hard, was it? Now you try it." His plane descended a bit to adjust his aim. His trajectory was correct, but when the time came to release the bomb, he didn't. He dropped it a second late. Which, of course, meant that the APC he was aiming for didn't blow up.

"I don't believe it!" Rowdy shouted. Funny. I didn't know he was watching. "He actually-"

"What? You think I was lying about not finishing my training?"

"Warning," Eagle Eye said. "The enemy's tracking you on radar."

You who? "Who, exactly, Eagle Eye?"

"Cipher."

I looked at Cipher again to see who exactly was trailing him. Turned out, it's none other than an A-10. Apparently, he noticed it the same time I did. "Ah, hell. A warthog."

"A what now?" Rowdy. Seriously? The dumbass has been in the air force for five years, and he hasn't heard of a goddamn Thunderbolt.

"A-10s, jackass."

"I'll handle it," Cipher said. As if there was any doubt he would. The man could handle a goddamn Belkan fighter. Handling an A-10 would be a piece of cake compared to that.

And... the warthog's been destroyed. "Seems like you got the air part handled."

"Which means the ground's all yours."

Really? He did know that the mandatory targets were all on the ground, didn't he? Which meant that _I_ would be getting a shitload of money while he got...well, not as much. Air targets didn't worth as much on this particular mission. "Whoopie. I'm gonna get the paycheck of my life right now."

Rowdy laughed. "Not if I get a say in it. We deserve a paycheck, too."

Really, Rowdy? "Rowdy. You're not a mercenary," Robin reminded him. Which was true. He wouldn't get more paycheck just because he got more kills.

"I never get any fun," Rowdy whined.

"This job isn't about fun."

"Hey," Scarlet chimed in, "think of it this way. When this war's over, we're still pilots for Ustio. They? They'll be out of job."

Ouch. "That's a low blow, girl," I told her. That's the sad truth about our job. We're only needed when there are wars. Ironic, considering I'm not particularly fond of wars.

"Huh. You're right. Thanks, Scarlet."

"Anytime."

My attention was suddenly caught by a red target below me. An APC. It didn't take long for me to destroy it.

"Our first defense unit is down!"I frowned. It was the enemy again. We really ought to handle all these radio frequency leaks. Someone could probably end up dead.

The others didn't seem to be as concerned as I was, though. "We're doing this, guys! Come on!"

"Just a little more and we can all return to our comfy beds."

Well, if that's the case... "Dropping, dropping," I said through the radio as I dropped a bomb. It landed on a SAM.

"The operation is proceeding smoothly," Eagle Eye announced. "Eliminate the remaining forces."

"Wait, wait, wait." Lance sounded flustered. I looked around, trying to find him, but I couldn't. It was only from his voice that I knew he was alive. Hell, for all I knew, he could be dead. "We're actually not that far away from 'mission accomplished'?"

Rowdy snorted. "Idiot. You're the one who said "just a little more"."

"I didn't know it was true!"

Seriously. The squadron I was assigned to were idiots. "I have a bunch of idiots for a squadron.." And it must be something if even their CAPTAIN agreed with me.

I laughed. "Robin, whatever you have, it's better than having a flight lead who can't shoot the broad side of a barn."

"HEY!" Of course he'd retaliate. Rookie's getting a bit predictable. "I think I'm a pretty good shot!"

"You're missing the point here, Cipher. A barn is ALWAYS on the ground."

"Yeah," Rowdy chimed in. "Barns don't have wings in Nostrand, do they?"

Even through the radio, I could hear Cipher grumbling. He must've forgotten how sensitive these mics were. "I'll show you just how good of a shot I am, Rowdy. Fox Two!"

As expected, Eagle Eye piped up. "Belkan aircraft destroyed." Huh. Figured that it was an air target.

There was someone groaning over the radio. "Didn't anyone request backup?" Somehow, I hadn't expected it to be the enemy. "Keep trying until we get a response!"

They had been calling for reinforcements? That means... It wouldn't be that long before there's someone coming to their rescue. Being in the Belkan Air Force for a year or so, I'd know. The Belkan Armed Forces weren't exactly the slowest of all the world militaries. "Things are gonna get tricky if reinforcements show up." No matter how good we are, we can't just take on enemy after enemy without care. We had limited ammo! Speaking of which... I looked at my ammo, realizing that I had spent a bit of what I had when I took off. I had to be careful from now on.

"Pixy!" It was Cipher. "They're really calling reinforcements?"

Well, duh. Didn't he listen to the enemy radio chatter? "Yeah."

"I don't see any more planes up here."

I rolled my eyes. "They're not here yet, dumbass."

"Oh wait, there they are." I looked at my radar, and sure enough, there were the planes, a bit far out. "Just a bit ahead. Which means I gotta go and meet up with them."

"Just try not to die on your date, buddy."

Cipher laughed. "This ain't a date. It's strictly business! Fox Two!"

"Enemy aircraft down," Eagle Eye announced.

I saw no targets around me. Seemed like I had destroyed them all. At least in the area I'm currently in. I pointed my plane further north, towards the end of the highway. "Hey," I called out to Cipher. Don't blame me. The targets in front of me are a bunch of tanks. Boring. "Even as 'strictly business' as it is, it can't count as a date-"

"Not a date!"

"Well, it doesn't count as whatever you call them if you end up killing each other."

"It's called a business meeting."

"Gladiator match is more like it."

There's a humming sound from the radio, presumably Cipher. "Ooh, that sounds like a great movie. Gladiators of the Skies."

I laughed. Was that what he seriously thought of? "Bet it's an Oscar-winning one. The one where the skilled fighter pilot – me – saves the world with the help of his sidekick, the dumbass rookie – that's you."

"One, not a dumbass. Two, I'm your flight lead, which makes you _my_ sidekick. And besides, that still doesn't count the- Fox Two!"

"Target neutralized," Eagle Eye said.

"Anyways, that still doesn't count the Halo Squad, who, as far as the war is concerned, is-"

"-currently being harassed by someone who DOESN'T STOP TALKING." I couldn't stop my laugh even if I tried. And I didn't. Lance sounded really pissed off.

"Talking isn't harassing, Lance," I reminded him.

"It is when you're distracting us!" Lance was practically shouting. It was beginning to hurt my ears. "You know that distractions are bad for our job, right?"

"Distractions are bad for any job," Cipher pointed out. And I had to admit that he was right.

"Moreover," I said, mind made up to piss Lance off even more, "what we're doing is definitely NOT the definition of harassing. Do you need a dictionary?"

He hissed. Actual, fucking hissed like a goddamn snake. Or maybe a fucking pissed off cat. I don't really know. "Fuck off, Pixy. You know what I meant."

"Oh come on, Lance," Rowdy said. "Even if Cipher and Pixy were as quiet as mutes, you wouldn't do any better. You'd still lag behind the rest of us."

"Shut up, Rowdy."

"Rowdy's right, Lance." I might end up regretting this by the end of the day, but pushing people up the wall is just so easy to do. And fun. It's like adding fuel to a fire. "You've got admit it and take it like a man."

"See, Lance, buddy?" Rowdy really sounded like he was trying to talk to a four-year-old in the middle of a tantrum, and I had to take my hand off the control stick and clamp my hand over my mouth to prevent from laughing. "Even Pixy agrees." I know that releasing control of my plane in the middle of a fight is a monumentally bad idea, but excuse me, okay? I gotta pretend to be all poker-face and shit here.

Lance seemed to hate it, though. "But that's not-"

"Hey, no excuses."

"Goddammit, Rowdy. Fuck you."

"Awww, you love me."

"Rowdy." Uh-oh. The fun police have arrived. A cop that went by the name of Robin. "Shut up or I'll reprimand you for chattering in battle."

"Ha!" Lance whooped. I couldn't decide if his reaction was borderline maniacal or not. "Get that, sucker!"

"Hey, no fair!" Rowdy's protests were barely heard over Lance's over-the-top celebrations. "Why don't you reprimand Lance? Or Pixy and Cipher?"

"Pixy and Cipher are from Galm Team. We're from Halo Squadron. I can't do anything about their chatter, but I can and will do something about yours later. That means you, too, Lance. How's that sound?"

Not a word from both pilots. I just laughed, noticing that Cipher's doing the same. "Keep an eye out for SAMs, they're gonna give us all they've got," I reminded him. I couldn't have him killed because he was distracted by radio chatter. The Base Commander would probably kill me especially since we're running out of pilots. Well, maybe not. If he did, then he'd be down two pilots and not just one. At least he'd make my life a living hell.

Cipher snorted. "Well, they're gonna give YOU all they've got. I'm higher up, remember?" Shit. I forgot that he couldn't hit ground targets.

"Asshole."

"Try to stay alive, pal."

I ignored him, instead focusing on the brand new targets in front of me. Sweet... I'm going to get the paycheck of my life. I noticed a cluster of houses nearby. I wondered if anyone were inside. There shouldn't be, but who knows? I hoped that none of our bombs hit them. It wouldn't be good for both sides.


	12. annex (part III)

"Hey, guys?" Scarlet. That's odd. She'd been pretty silent for a while. Where is she? "A little help? I got a tank that won't blow up."

"You mean, you got a tank that you can't seem to hit?" Rowdy asked, clearly trying to hold back laughter. I knew that he wouldn't rile her up too much. I think he had the hots for her. I didn't ask, though, so I couldn't know for sure.

"Wait... make that six tanks. Yeah. That's six tanks."

How did she miscount six tanks for one? "So is it one or is it six?" Rowdy sounded just as, if not more, confused as I was.

"Six."

He chuckled. "You sure? Want me to count it for you, sweetcheeks?"

"Rowdy..." Uh-oh. Scarlet's growling. Like, legit, actual growling.

"Hang on, Scarlet." What the heck is Cipher up to now? "I'll help." I barely resisted the urge to just scream at him that he DID NOT complete his ground training.

Scarlet seemed to think what I was thinking. "Says the guy who didn't complete ground training?"

"Hey, you want my help or not?"

There was a pause as Scarlet thought it over. "Fine. Just don't miss and hit me instead."

"Ha-ha," Cipher drawled. "Very funny."

It's true though, Cipher. You had to admit that. I looked to where I assumed Cipher was. According to my radar, he was some ways behind me, although he was more towards my right. Yeah, yeah, I knew it was risky for me to look back in a fight, but there were no fighters nearby. I figured it was safe enough.

I saw Cipher descending. His trajectory was different. Sharper, more aiming towards the ground. It looked like he was going to shoot those tanks. When I saw the tanks explode with no bombs dropped, I knew I guessed right. I'd say that's a bit of an improvement (although he was cheating – he didn't use bombs).

Scarlet came down not long after. Her aiming, which was better, bagged her three tanks.

"You're not half bad, Cipher," Scarlet said.

Cipher huffed. "That's because I used guns. I suck with bombs."

"Whatever works, dude. Now why don't you use that on that last tank?"

"Wilco." Cipher lined up for another shot, all ready to shoot. "Hang on, I'll- Dammit."

"What's wrong?"

"I'm winchester on guns." Wow. Seemed like this mission went on for far longer than I thought. My gun was still half, but my bombs were almost gone. I looked again at my radar. We still had a quite a bit of targets to go. It'd be a pretty close cut. And... were those actually new targets? When did they appear?

"Captain!" The enemy. "There's smoke by the bridge! We're about to enter the battle zone." Ah. Figured. Of course they were the enemy reinforcements. Thank goodness that they weren't fighters. I didn't bring a whole lot of missiles with me, mostly bombs.

"Reinforcement's here," I said to everyone.

Cipher just laughed. "The more, the merrier."

I laughed back. "Let's get them."

"I didn't come all this way to be stopped now. Hold tight, we'll cut right through!" Cut right through _what_? I didn't see anything blocking their route except for.. one of their own? Why were the Belkans that disorganized? These aren't the Belkans I knew!

"Wait, the reinforcement's another freaking ground unit?"

I almost couldn't believe Cipher didn't know that. Wasn't that pretty obvious? "Well, yeah. Ruchs Transport Unit, remember?"

There was a nervous laugh. "On second thought, I'll skip this one. You get them."

"What? Why?"

"I'm out of guns."

"Then use your bombs."

"I can't."

There was another enemy radio chatter, but I raised my voice so I would still be heard. "Use them. Can't hurt to try. Just don't get killed."

"But-"

"No buts."

"Yessir."

Why do I feel like _I'm_ the flight lead now? Never mind. I still had targets to destroy. I managed to bag an APC and a tank. Just ahead of that was also a SAM. Of course, it wasn't there for very long. "Our 2nd defense unit is down! How could this happen?! There're only a few enemy fighters up there!"

Well, I'd say that the fact that we're pretty good was the reason for your destruction, Belkans. But hey, I could be wrong. Maybe continue this war to prove my hypothesis?

"There aren't many Belkan ground forces left," Eagle Eye announced. "Continue operation."

There was a laugh over the radio at that. "Yeehaw! Get a load of this flying, suckers!" It sounded like Lance, but it could also be Rowdy. Those two sounded pretty similar. Maybe it was because they're both Ustians. (And since they're Ustians and not Oseans, they make pretty lousy cowboy impressions.)

"Lance's in a better mood." Rowdy. So that poor excuse of a cowboy must be Lance.

"Must've been talking to his girl again through the radio," Scarlet commented.

Lance groaned. I couldn't help but smile. "I was NOT talking to Rena," he all but shouted into his mic. I winced. With all the radio chatter going on, someone shouting is the last thing I need.

"That your girl?" I asked. Just as a confirmation. (Well, it's more to annoy Lance, but that's for me to know only.)

"No," Lance snorted. "It's yours. OF COURSE that's my girl! Who else could it be?"

I was about to say something else when someone else cut me to the chase. "This supply route is their lifeline! Don't let them take it back!"

(Now I understand why the Belkans are involved in most of the major wars in history. They can be such douchebags - and yes, I realized the irony of my statement, but COME ON! They didn't even have to go all the way to _our_ frequency.)

"Well, guess what? You're about to lose it. Fox 2!" From the corner of my eye, I saw an F4 Phantom explode several miles away, another plane sweeping by just barely dodging the debris. It was Robin.

"Boss, are you talking to the enemy?"

There was a grumble from Robin. "Shut it, Rowdy."

When there wasn't a response from Rowdy after a few seconds, I figured that he'd act wise for once and actually follow his flight lead's orders. But of course, this is _Rowdy_ we're talking about. "Lance." Rowdy was whispering, that idiot. Didn't he know that all of us were in the same frequency? "The boss' lost it. He's talking to the enemy."

"You know we use the same frequency, right?" Robin sounded amused and in disbelief. Not that I blamed him. "Idiots."

I rolled my eyes. There were no targets in sight (there hadn't been for a while now) so I might as well jumped in the fray. "Rowdy, if you call what Robin's doing "crazy", then Cipher and I are too."

I heard Cipher say something, but it's drowned out by Rowdy's obnoxious laugh. "Pixy, that's a given since both of you are certified nutjobs. It's your job to be a nutjob. Or at least act like it. But you're doing great!"

"Asshole."

At last, I saw a SAM in front of me. Not my preferred target, but at least it was something. This mission was too long, and it was getting boring.

"Do they intend to wipe out everything?" a Belkan said. I resisted the urge to shut down my radio then and there, but I knew if I did, the results could be... chaotic, to say the least. So instead, I decided to answer him. Just for the sake of it. "Nah, not everything. We're just wiping YOU out."

"See?" Rowdy sounded way too excited. It's borderline dangerous. "What did I tell you? You're doing a great job."

How did I forget that he could listen and annoy me at all times? "Like I said, asshole. I don't know why I'm sticking around you guys."

"No one told you to," Lance said. "Go on, hop back to your rookie flight lead before he gets himself killed."

Well, he had a point. "Don't mind if I do." I broke away from the formation (as loose as it was, it was still a formation) and headed to where Cipher was. To my surprise, he wasn't that far away. Nor was he as high up as I expected. In fact, he was tangling with a SAM. He circled it, like a bird would its prey. Well, he looked more like a confused bird, which made sense since what he was doing was downright dangerous. If he had been circling a tank, it would've been fine. But it was a SAM. A SAM, that could send a torrent of missiles at you in a moment's notice.

It seemed all too soon before something was launched from the ground target. "Missile! Missile incoming!"

I needn't have worried. Cipher, that crazy rookie, just did a barrel roll before diving and swooping under a bridge, the missile detonating harmlessly in the water. "Cipher, you're crazy."

"No, I'm not."

Really? "Says someone who just flew an Eagle under a bridge just to outrun a SAM."

"Who'd you rather call more sane? Someone who flew a one-winged Eagle, or someone who did what I just did?"

This conversation again? This is getting old... "Neither," Scarlet answered. "You're both crazy."

Hypocrite. She could be bat-shit crazy if she wanted to. I could perfectly remember the time when she blasted some heavy metal music through our radios, back when I first came to Valais. It was... interesting, to say the least. She did get an earful from the Base Commander later on, though.

I was about to remind her when something else caught my attention. My radar flashed red, and I saw an enemy plane behind me. Wait. Make that three. "Oh, come on!"

I tried turning a sharp bank to shake them off, but they wouldn't budge. "What's wrong, Pixy?" Cipher asked.

Well, I guess I could use some help... "Enemy on my tail. Three of 'em."

"Break right," Cipher ordered immediately. "I'll scatter them with these missiles. On three... One. Two. Three!"

With little time to prepare for the maneuver, I felt the strain of the G-Force pulling against me as I braked and jerked the control stick at the same time. Blood rushed past my ears, almost drowning out the beeping of my plane's on-board computer warning me of someone locking onto me. When I completed my turn, both the computer have silenced and one of the enemy planes were hit. There was only one plane left behind me. "Thanks, Cipher. Now to settle with this one."

It didn't take long for me to finish the bastard off. Once I was done, I checked how Cipher was doing. Even though I know how good he was, I couldn't help but worry. Blackhawk was also pretty good, and look where he ended up. But seeing how he just did a stall turn before hitting the enemy's cockpit, I'd say he's doing all right. "Pretty fast, Cipher."

"Yeah." I could practically hear the grin in the rookie's voice. "But where are the other targets? Are they all gone? I thought they would've guarded this transport route better, seeing how it's so vital."

"They don't have enough firepower to hold us off," I explained. "It's because they set up too many points of operation."

"But what about-"

"Cipher. Shut up and kick some Belkan ass." Sue me, but I was in the middle of a mission. Banter kind of distractions I could handle, but professor-worthy questions kind of distractions? No, thanks. I'm good.

"Aren't you Belkan, too?" No shit, Sherlock.

There was a laugh. The Halo Squadron, I bet. "The battle of the century," Rowdy said in an announcer-like voice. "The war-hardened crazy-assed veteran versus the suicidal rookie."

...what the actual fuck? "Hey, I'm not-"

"Place your bets right here, ladies and gentlemen, and prepare for a battle that would amaze your minds."

"In your dreams, Rowdy," Cipher shot back. His voice had somehow lost all trace of humor. "You'll never get a chance to see that since we're freaking allies." I wondered what was bothering him. Surely it couldn't be because of what Rowdy said?

"Let's get this over with," Cipher said again before I could say anything. I could only watch as he broke away and engaged a MiG-21 and his wingman.

"Agreed," Robin said. He must have not realized Cipher's change of mood. "I've got a chess game to finish..."

"Just give up now, Gil, and spare the embarrassment of losing. I'm THIS close to check-mating you. It's hopeless to put up a fight."

"Give up? You wish."

My missile alert blared to life for what must've been the second time in a few minutes. I looked down to see a SAM already sending a missile towards me. I rolled, avoiding the missile by inches, before sending a hail of bullets at the SAM. It exploded within seconds, and then...

"All targets destroyed," Eagle Eye announced. Just in time. I'd been counting down since... well, two, three targets ago? "Operation complete. Now the Allied Forces can secure a military transport route. Well done."

I laughed. "Hey, Cipher! Told you the Allied Forces is happening!"

"Well, congratulations to our war expert then." Cipher still sounded off, but a bit better than before. Probably the best I could hope for.

"Looks like luck was on your side again, Solo Wing," Eagle Eye said. I felt myself grinning at the nickname, and answered, "Yeah, well, I've had my fill of goin' home without wings."


	13. in-between 2a

A/N: Sorry that this chapter takes sooo long to go up. School :(

Anyways, enjoy!

It was early enough when we came back to base that we had a lot of time in our hands. Having nothing else to do, I ended up in the hangars, checking out my Eagle. The plane had suffered several bullet hits during the mission. It wasn't much of a surprise, seeing as we encountered a shitload of AA guns along the way and during the attack. Luckily, it wasn't that much of a damage that I ended up crashing or something. It was still a bit annoying, though.

It wasn't that hard to patch them up. I was halfway done when I heard a knock on the hangar doors. "Can I come in?" It was Scarlet.

"Come on in," I said to her, not bothering to turn and look. My attention was focused on the hole in the metal in front of me. It had to be the sixth hole, if not seventh, that I'd patched up. Which was weird. I didn't remember getting shot so many times.

I heard some shuffling before Scarlet was crouching down near me. Well, as close to me as she could get, seeing how I was under a plane. "Wow, that looks nasty. Did she get hit much?"

"Nope," I replied, a bit strained since I was lying on the floor under the plane. I began to slowly smooth over the newly filled hole, the jagged edges getting duller and duller by the second. "There's only about a dozen of these, I think. I didn't really count."

Scarlet laughed. "Why don't you just leave it for the mechanics?"

"I was bored," I admitted. I placed my tools down by my side before running my fingers over the recently mended metal. It felt smooth enough. After I painted it over, it wouldn't even show.

But I didn't think I'd bother to do that. The damage was in a plate near the plane's undercarriage, barely visible. "I thought you'd be planning a revenge on Rowdy right now," she said.

Huh? I pulled myself out from under the plane and stared at her. "Why would I try to plan a revenge on Rowdy?"

Scarlet shot a disbelieving look at me, which, I admit, made me feel like I've done something foolish. "You don't remember?"

I shook my head.

"He pissed you off so bad you almost shot him down."

Wait, what? "No way," I snorted, shaking my head. I stood up, making my way to the cupboard with all the paint cans.

"Yes way." Scarlet followed me, crossing her arms. "At least, you pretended to. Or was it real and the only reason Rowdy is alive is because Gil stopped you?"

I rolled my eyes at her. Really, she's ridiculous. There was no way I'd shoot an ally down. She had to have realized that, right? "Are you seriously asking this?"

She frowned. "Ok, stupid question."

At least she finally got it. Still, though... "So, since I'm supposed to plan a revenge against Rowdy... Would you like to help?"

"Hell, yeah."

_X_

I shouldn't be surprised that Lance ended up joining our "mission." Any pranks that either of us came up with had something to do with Rowdy's room. And, it turned out, Rowdy shared a room with Lance. So it would be hard to do anything without Lance knowing.

Still, even with three people planning the entire thing, it still went wrong...

*knock knock*

"It's open!" Lance shouted, grinning. I couldn't help but stare at the makeshift contraption above the door. There's a water bottle taped to the wall facing downwards. The only thing that keeps the water inside it from escaping is the balloon on its neck, and even that won't stay there for long. Sure enough, the door was pushed open, knocking the balloon out of place. There was a splash, a yelp, and then, silence. Not a single laughter from me, Lance and Scarlet.

The soaked face glaring at us would've been extremely funny if it wasn't the wrong one.

Lance grimaced. "Uhh, hi there, Boss."

If looks could kill, Robin's was enough to kill every single pilot in the Belkan Air Force.

"I suggest that you boys start running."

Well, when he was the one who said it, who would complain?

_X_

Running away from Robin all day was not fun.

I figured that the best way to hide from him was to go on patrol. Flying was about as far as I'd ever get without getting into trouble. There's just one small problem. Cipher was in the middle of a briefing with Base Commander Ovechkin and Major Richards. And no one was allowed to go up alone. Just my luck.

So I turned to the next best thing. The weapons storage. The weapons storage was this building just behind the hangar. It was, as you could guess, used to store weapons. From bombs, cannon rounds, to the highest-tech missiles, you name it, they have it. They had to have a complete stock, especially since they have mercenaries. We tend to come with different planes that need different weapons. For example, the bombs that were compatible with my Eagle wouldn't necessarily fit into the Skyhawk's weapon systems.

Not that we had those, though... With the arrival of the Hornets, the Tomcats and the Eagles, Skyhawks aren't used that much anymore. From what I heard, they need extensive maintenance. A difficult bird to handle and nurture, so people often turned to the others.

As I had expected, the weapons storage was pretty empty. No one would be going on patrol for the next three hours or so, which means the mechanics would have ample time to rest and enjoy themselves. They've more than deserved it. Who would want to be stuck in a storage like this anyways? It's dark, dusty, and I had to admit, a bit creepy.

It totally made sense when you'd counted the fact that in this place, a single lit match could literally kill you.

_X_

Waiting around in a weapons storage was boring. Actually, boring would be an understatement. Imagine being locked in a room empty of anything to entertain you, and you have to spend hours in there, all the while watching your step so a bomb wouldn't go off. It's boring and nerve-wracking. I might be a pilot, and I might love my Eagle to pieces, but I don't hold the same sentiment with bombs or missiles. It's weird. I know. But can you really blame me? I just spent the last two hours in this joint, with another full hour feeling completely miserable because the lunch bell just rang. I'm starving and I couldn't even move!

Next time I run into Scarlet, I'm going to make sure she regrets trolling me like this. Although, does it count as trolling if it gets back at you, too?

*squueeaaakkk*

What the fuck was that? I went completely still. I couldn't see the door from where I was sitting, but I could see the little bit of light that scattered on the floor through the opening. I knew that it could be Robin. But at the same time, it could be anyone but him.

"Pixy? Are you here?"

Well, that definitely answered my question. "Over here, Cipher," I said, stepping out from behind the crate I was using to hide. I couldn't help but grin when I saw him. "What the hell are you doing here?"

Cipher shrugged. "I could ask the same thing to you, you know?" He held out a small plastic bag towards me. I took it and opened it. It was filled with several sandwiches. "When you didn't show up for lunch and Robin looked ready to rain hell, I figured that you were hiding from him. Took me a while, but I found you and brought this for you."

I laughed, clapping Cipher's back. "Well, aren't you a good flight lead? Thanks, buddy." I took out one sandwich and began eating it. It was so good. I doubted I've had anything as good as that before. Cipher is a life saver. "Gil should be more like you. Then, there'd be no more cases like this."

"Pretty sure he chased you because of whatever you did to him," Cipher said, rolling his eyes. "That means, it's likely your fault, not his."

"Semantics," I argued. "If Gil didn't get his panties in a twist, neither of us would be here right now."

"Which brings up my point. He wouldn't have gotten his panties in a twist if you didn't do anything you're not supposed to do. Speaking of which, what did you do, anyways?"

I took time to swallow my food down - I may be a mercenary who military pilots basically considered as no good money-hungry hunters, but I do have manners - before I spoke. "It was just a prank. I wasn't even targeting Gil. It was supposed to be for Rowdy. Gil was just in the wrong place and the wrong time."

"Or the right place at the right time."

Uh-oh. "Shit," Standing up, I could clearly see Gil on the doorway. Fuck.

Beside me, Cipher started standing up as well. "I swear no one was following me! How did you-"

"You're not exactly spy-material, Cipher," Gil remarked, walking towards both of us. He looked smug. "I wouldn't have guessed that this was your hiding spot. I'm sure Cipher didn't think so, either, seeing as he took more than a few tries before getting here. I was about to give up, but boy, am I glad I stuck to it."

Of course. Leave it to Gil to get things done. "Fine, fine, you win, Gil," I laughed. I threw my hands up for emphasis. "Now what are you gonna do?"

I didn't have time to do anything before I had something thrown at my face. It was creamy, soft, and definitely messy. Was it...

"Seriously, Gil? Shaving cream pie throw?"

"What can I say, Larry? Revenge is a dish best served cold... with pie."

I would've laughed, but the cream was so cold, I think my face would go numb soon. "Damn it, Gil." I wiped some of the cream off, with a few falling and staining my flight suit. Great.

"Come on," Cipher said, grinning. "I bet there's some food left in the mess. Bet it's better lunch than a couple of sandwiches."

Best idea I've heard all day.

_X_

"So." I looked at Cipher, sat across the table from me. He had his notebook and was sketching in it. From the looks of it, it would end up a pretty decent impression of an eagle. "How did your briefing go?"

"Well... not too shabby," he answered, not looking up. He was still drawing the eagle. "The Commander went over the base rules and made sure all my papers were sorted out. You know, so I can officially call myself a mercenary and not just a runaway Air Force pilot. Also, the Major went over a few more rules."

A few more rules? "Such as?"

Cipher sighed. He stopped his drawing and looked up, his eyes meeting mine. "Apparently, since I'm a new guy, I can't leave base grounds unless for missions."

"That sucks," I said. "It's standard procedure, though."

Nodding, Cipher resumed his drawing. "I knew that. Didn't mean it sucks any less, though. I was looking forward to the famous Ustian ginger ale Rowdy told me a few days ago."

I couldn't help but laugh. He was upset over some ginger ale? "They really are great," I told him. "Tell you what. I'll go with you as soon as you're cleared to go."

The way his eyes light up was priceless. "Really?" I grinned. He looked like a kid about to receive a present that he'd always wanted.

"Really." Somehow, I felt something like a déja vu.

"Thanks, Pixy."

By the time we left the mess, he was still smiling.

_X_

Thankfully for all of us, the rest of the day went by uneventfully. Literally. No patrol flights, no briefings, no whatsoever.

I wouldn't have guessed that a war was going on if not for the fact that I was a mercenary still working for Ustio. Hell, seeing as I was outside the base, hiding behind a snow pile with a couple of snowballs at my feet, I might as well still in flight academy.

I peeked above the snow, only to duck again as a projectile came dangerously close to me. "Close, but no cigar, Cipher!" I shouted. I mashed around some snow in my hands, making them as round as I possibly could. Once they were solid, I peeked above the snow bank again, arms ready to throw the snow. "Ready? Here comes the snow, buddy!"

But this time, I couldn't see where Cipher was. "Son of a bitch..." I looked around, hoping I'd see any sign of him. Everything around me was still, no sign of life. I crouched back behind the snowbank. Maybe if I waited long enough, I could draw him out.

Maybe.

"What in the living hell are you doing?"

I peeked above the snowbank and saw Rowdy and Lance coming towards me. I glanced at the snowball still in my hands. "What else?" Before I gave them a chance to answer, I'd already hurled the snowball towards Lance, and then another one to Rowdy.

Perfect hits.

"What the- This is so on, Pix!" Enraged, Rowdy grabbed a fistful of snow, throwing them at me without even bothering to make them into a ball. I didn't dodge. I didn't need to. They fell flat just a few feet from Rowdy.

"Sucker!" I shouted at him, quickly diving behind a new snowbank that stood between me and the two Halo Squad members. Just in time, too. A couple of snowballs flew close over my head, while another hit the snowbank with a dull thud.

I crouched, making more snowballs. I tried to hear for any approaching footsteps. The thing is, with snow, every time you walk, other people can hear you. So far, I'd heard nothing of the sorts. But maybe it was just covered by all the shouting. And trust me, Rowdy and Lance could be really loud when they wanted to.

I stood up, throwing a snowball at Lance. I was about to throw another one at Rowdy when something hit the back of my head. Something wet, a bit soft, and very, very cold.

"Got him!" Of course it was Cipher. I turned around to find him behind a snowbank. The little punk was grinning, too.

"Get him some more!" Lance shouted. I felt more snowballs pepper the back of my flight suit.

My new flight suit.

"Hey, watch the flight suit!" I yelled. "Base Commander's gonna kill me if I show up with snow in my suit!"

"Your fault for suggesting this in the first place!" Cipher yelled back. Then, more snowballs hit me, making my suit even wetter.

Perfect. Just perfect.


	14. in-between 2b

There was a knock on my door at 5 a.m.

I was awake by then, and so was Cipher. Being Belkans, we are used to waking up early. (Is Cipher a Belkan though? Considering Nostrand was destroyed by Belka, I figured that that means he's _technically_ a Belkan. Especially since Nostrand had been a part of Belka before it separated itself. But I'm sure he wouldn't appreciate it if I called him one.) I think amongst everyone in this base, only the Oseans woke up after 6 a.m. But being woken up at 5? Something must be wrong.

"Come in!" Cipher said. Not too loud to wake up our neighbours, but at least enough so the guy (or girl) outside would be able to hear him.

The door was wrenched open and a head poked in.

It was Viktor Malkin.

"Pixy, Cipher," he said, smiling. "Briefing in fifteen. Don't be late."

I nodded. "We'll be there, Malkin. Thanks."

"No problem."

As soon as he was out, I began swearing. "Fuck. Something's wrong."

"You tell me," Cipher said, shrugging. "Come on. Let's get to the briefing room before Commander decides it's not too early to slice someone's head off."

_X_

We were, apparently, right on time, seeing as briefing started almost as soon as we were through the door.

"Listen up, people! Our intelligence just recently discovered enemy movement near Hoffnung. They suspect that something's going to go down there."

Something's about to go down? In Hoffnung? It didn't seem right. Hoffnung was an industrial city. The worst thing they could do was...

...manufacture weaponry.

Shit.

"They said that Belka is preparing a superweapon," Ovechkin continued. He pulled up a few pictures of Hoffnung and a map of the general area. I noticed that it was probably recently updated. The city seemed larger than it was when I last visited it. Of course, it was a good few years ago. Anything could happen. "Something deadly enough that can probably turn the tide of war against us."

He clasped his hands together, grinning at the room. "Now, who wants to volunteer for a recon mission?"

You've got to be kidding me.

"Whoever is going there will need to stay under radar if they hope to reach Hoffnung in one piece," Ovechkin continued. As if what he'd just said wasn't enough to probably make some of us shit our pants. Literally, he just asked if anyone wanted to volunteer to go to a city where a superweapon was probably being created in secrecy. Anyone approaching it would be shot dead. Belka would do anything to protect their secret. To get close enough to get pictures? Insanity. "From there, you'll take pictures of the place to see if we can get an idea on what this weapon might be. At the same time, there will be a team on the ground who will try to hack into the systems. The pilot, while flying and taking photos, will be the distraction necessary for the hacker to do their job and retrieve the data. You will go tonight, at 1900 sharp."

Well, at least they used a hacker. Whoever the pilot would be, they wouldn't have to stay still so the picture wouldn't be blurry. Staying still in the middle of an area jam-packed with AAs would be suicide.

"Now. Any takers?"

I looked around. No one from Halo Squadron raised their hands. I saw Cipher shoot a questioning look at me. I nodded. I would want to take the mission. It seemed challenging. That's what us mercenaries were supposed to do, right? Do crazy, daredevil things? Even if we didn't make it in the end, it would still be awesome. Not a shabby way to die.

"We'll take it."

It wasn't Cipher. I looked to the two people at the very front of the room and recognized them instantly. It was the Green Freaks.

"Thank you," Ovechkin grinned at them. He flicked a switch, and the lights turned back on. "And that about sums it up. Get moving, people."

Well, if the Green Freaks wanted to take the suicide mission, who were we to challenge them?

_X_

"Man, those assholes are dead," Rowdy laughed. He took a few cards from the pile on the table, courtesy of Scarlet's +2 attack cards. "I mean, Hoffnung? Just one look at the map, I know the place's loaded with flaks and SAMs. They're crazy if they think they can take it with just the two of them."

"Don't forget the air strip just outside the city." Lance changed the TV's channel for the fifth time in the last minute. The running cartoon mouse was instantly replaced with a hockey game. I tried to watch it, but the grainy quality of the shitty TV made it impossible for me to see what's happening. The puck was as good as invisible. "There are gonna be Belkan fighters. I guarantee that."

Beside me, Robin took another bite out of his doughnut. I could see some of the chocolate cream rubbed off against the cards. "Well, they're big boys. They can make their own decisions and deal with it."

He had a point. But still... assholes or not, we should help them. Somehow, some way. "Shouldn't we at least stand-by somewhere near them?" I asked the group. I saw Rowdy look at me, clearly unhappy, but I didn't care. "It's not right. You said it yourselves. It's a suicide mission. And they're crazy to do it with just the two of them. If we're ready to help them at any time, at least when shit hits the fan, we probably don't have to bury two more pilots."

Pilots. That's what we were. Brothers in the skies. No matter how we hated each other on the ground, we should always leave it there and get ready to help them in the skies ASAP.

Of course, that depends on the fact of whether or not you're on the same sides of the war.

"Such a good-mannered honorable Belkan," Scarlet laughed. She took a swig of her beer, wincing a bit at the taste before continuing. "But you forgot one fact, Larry. Their aircrafts are stealth. You said it yourself when you told us about that run-in on their first day. If anybody can go through that place alive, it's them."

The others seemed to agree. I was about to argue, but then I saw Cipher looking towards me. I looked back. If I hadn't, I would probably miss the small nod he gave me, smiling as he did so.

He agreed with my plan.

_X_

As per usual, I had lunch in the mess with Halo Squadron and Cipher. I kept looking at Cipher. So far, I hadn't had the time to talk to him and discuss our plan. Our plan, which included us trying to go unnoticed as we follow two guys on a recon mission as close as possible without blowing the whole mission up to high heaven.

Yup. We're definitely crazy.

"Since we practically have nothing to do," Scarlet said as soon as we were sat down on the table, "why don't we go out? We've been trapped in this place for a while, might as well we go out and have fun."

"Great idea," Robin agreed. He swatted Rowdy's hand away from where he was about to swipe his doughnut. "I heard the good café in town has reopened, thanks to some smuggled goods from Osea. Great chance to finally get some decent coffee."

I shot a look at Cipher, and he shrugged in response, smiling. He looked towards Robin. "Well, you guys go ahead. I think I'm gonna stay behind."

"But why?" Rowdy whined. I noticed his hand sneaking in to snatch a sandwich from Cipher's plate, but he didn't seem to pay any attention to it. "Such a party pooper. No one says you can't get off base and have some fun."

"Actually, I've been specifically told to stay by Commander Ovechkin," he said, taking a sip of his coffee and grimacing. "I'd love to get something other than this shitty coffee, but hey, orders are orders."

Scarlet nodded. "Understandable," she said. She then pointed to me. "But _you_ are going with us, aren't you?"

I knew I wouldn't. Not when I had to make sure those Green Freaks wouldn't be dead by tomorrow. "You know what? I think I'm gonna stay behind and make sure Cipher gets the ground training he needs." I grinned, winking at my flight leader. "Gotta make sure the whole fiasco in Arlon never happens again."

Cipher glared at me. "No need to be rude. Sure, I'm not good, but I'm not that bad, either."

"I beg to differ," Rowdy said. "You were awful."

"This coming from the guy who couldn't take down a Belkan bomber." Cipher moved to grab the sandwich that was on his plate...

...only to realize that it was no longer there.

"Hey! Where did my sandwich go?" He looked on the floor behind him. When he couldn't find it there, he looked under the table. "I swear I grabbed one... Where did it go?"

"Rowdy ate it," I told him simply. He immediately looked up, glaring daggers at me. "What? It was your problem, not mine."

"Snitch," Rowdy whispered-shout. I just shrugged. I was more paying attention to Cipher. Who, if I wasn't mistaken, was getting ready to instigate a food fight by throwing some of Scarlet's chips at Rowdy.

Not fucking again.

As soon as Cipher's hand got anywhere close to the chips, though, Scarlet batted it away. "Hey! Choose your own ammo!" She pulled the plate closer to her, not unlike a dragon with their hoard of gold.

And was Cipher actually pouting? "But Rowdy took my sandwich! I don't have any ammo!"

Thank Force for Rowdy's bottomless pit and lack of understanding concerning personal space. "Then that means you should not throw things at people, especially food." Cipher glared at me, and I knew why. I might have sounded a bit like I was scolding a child. Which probably wasn't too far from the truth, and he really didn't appreciate it. But can you blame me? I was _not_ looking forward to getting caught in a food fight by Commander Ovechkin. The man was scary enough when he wasn't pissed.

_X_

I looked on as Robin's car drove away with two passengers waving out the window at us. I wished I could go with them, but it wasn't like I could leave Cipher hanging. It would feel like I was abandoning Blackhawk.

Force, I _missed_ him.

If I squinted, I knew I could see the lumps on the hill near the one Valais was stationed on. The lumps, barely visible against the bright sun and blurred by the distance between us. Still, I knew what they were.

I knew _exactly_ what they were.

They were the gravestones of... well, everyone that used to work in Valais. People who used to work here, but didn't anymore since they were dead.

Dead.

Just like the Green Freaks would be in a few hours if we chose to not do anything.

Just like any of us could've been, at any given moment.

Sometimes, I hated this job. Sure, I loved flying, and there wouldn't be a chance for me to do that without war. Mercenary, remember?

But was this whole killing thing really necessary?


	15. in-between 2c

"Galm One, Galm Two, cleared for takeoff."

I smiled, snapping my mask into place. "Roger that. Taking off."

I was about to taxi down the runway when there was another transmission from the Control Tower. "Make sure those mercenaries get back alive, boys "

What? "What mercenaries?" I played dumb. Maybe it was all a coincidence. There was no way Zachary - our freaking Control Tower guy who has "Mockingbird" as a callsign - had figured out the real reason we were out there.

"Puh-lease," Zach snorted over the radio. "You are carrying enough fuel to go to Hoffnung and back again. And need I mention the fact that you are carrying bombs on top of your air-to-air missiles? Don't play coy with me, Larry."

...dammit. "You breathe a word of this to anyone else, and I will kill you." I meant it. He may be our Control Tower guy, but I figured I could still get away with it. We're mercenaries. The top brass still looked at us with suspicion. It was probably what they expected us to do.

Zach laughed. "Your secret's safe with me. Just make sure you guys maintained at least a distance of 50 kilometers from Hoffnung. No radars can get a sniff at you if you go no closer than that."

50 kilometers... that means... "So if anything goes south, they have to last about three minutes before we can get there to lend a hand."

"Beggars can't be choosers," Zach replied. "Besides, most pilots should be able to last three minutes. Basic skills, man. If they can't do it, they ain't a pilot."

Well, he isn't exactly wrong... "Fine, fine. Just keep your mouth shut."

"Roger that."

I climbed to my spot at Cipher's wing. The skies were blue, for once, instead of their usual grey snow clouds. A rare treat here in Valais.

Sometimes, when you're flying in skies like these, it's easy to forget that you're in a war. It's so peaceful up here, it's hard to imagine the chaos we'll see should we ever fly close to the ground. These things make me wish I can fly on forever, never having to land.

It's never going to be any more than a wish, though.

_X_

The journey to Hoffnung was boring. Like, real fucking boring. Since both Cipher and I were on our own mission which no one else can find out, we had to maintain radio silence. Also, we had to fly high up in the skies, above the clouds. It was safer than flying near the ground because we'd probably attract unwanted attention. Who knew who could be watching? If people saw us and our Ustian flags and one of them happened to be a Belkan soldier, they'd most likely alert the higher ups. And if that happened, we're all doomed. If we're discovered, the Green Freaks were even more likely to get discovered.

Well, there's a reason they're called the _Green Freaks_.

I wondered if Commander Ovechkin had any idea what their planes looked like. Had he known, he probably wouldn't let any of them do this mission without a second thought.

_X_

"Pixy?"

I groaned, unable to hold myself. "Cipher. What part of radio silence do you not understand?"

"None. But shouldn't there be a sign from them right now? I mean, they'd call for help if they needed to, right?"

I frowned as I thought of it. It was a good question. How would we know they're in trouble if they insisted on maintaining radio silence? They didn't know we were near them. For all they knew, they were all alone. Not even the AWACS tagged along for this mission. Completely and utterly alone, with only the guys at the Control Tower to keep them comp-

The Control Tower.

Zach.

I pulled out my phone. It was something I always kept with me, regardless of where I was or would be. Habit. Blackhawk wanted to have a way to communicate during radio silence. And since the phone was all I could came up with, there it was. It was kind of funny, texting your wingman when you're flying towards a battle. But at least we weren't texting while driving. There were no pedestrians in the sky.

I pulled up Zach's number and hit call.

 _ ***RING***_

 _ ***RING***_

 _ ***RING***_

"Hello?"

"Thank God. Zach! It's Larry!"

"Larry?!" I grinned at the surprise in Zach's voice. "What the- I thought you were-"

"Yes, we are still doing it," I cut in immediately. I didn't want him to spill the whole thing in front of the entire Control Tower. "I need your help. Do you have eyes on them?"

"Them? Hang on." I heard several clicks in the background, like someone was typing away at something. "Yeah. You want me to keep you updated?"

I smiled. I knew I could count on him. "If you wouldn't mind. Just tell me if they're in trouble."

"Roger that."

 _ ***BEEP***_

I tucked my phone back inside my pocket. It was a crazy way to get updates, but maybe it would work.

"DID YOU JUST-"

"Yes, I just called him. Now keep quiet."

_X_

It was half an hour later when I felt my phone buzz in my pocket.

I peeked to see the name on the screen. Once I confirmed it as Zachary's, I dived. "Come on, Cipher. Go time." I didn't bother to pick up. I knew that Zachary had kept an eye on everything. He would notice if we were trying to help.

"Okay, Pixy. Split up? You help one, and I'll help the other."

I grinned. "Sounds good to me."

Once we were out of the clouds, though, we could see that it was chaos. There were flaks everywhere, lighting up the sky. It seemed like it was raining bullets. And in the middle of it all was the easily distinguished Green Freaks.

"RIP! To your right! Watch out!"

Okay, it was _bad_. "Pixy, you go right, I go left. Okay?"

"Roger that." I headed to the Green Freak on the left. The guy had just barely avoided a missile from a SAM. I took a look at his plane. It had some holes in it already, and there were only four planes in the sky. Our planes.

If the enemy sent reinforcements, they wouldn't last much longer.

I put myself on his wing. "The hell?! Solo Wing?!"

"In the flesh." My missile alert screamed in my ears. A missile was coming towards me, probably from the same SAM that tried to kill this Green Freak (Rip?) earlier. I avoided it with a simple barrel roll. "Rip, is it?"

"Yes, but what are you doing here? The Commander said no reinforcements."

"We just happened to be in the neighborhood." I scanned my radar to see if there was any development. So far, there wasn't much. Just a few planes coming in hot. Great. "Okay, guys. There's some planes coming in from the northwest, probably just a minute out."

"10-4, Pixy," Cipher answered. I looked at his plane, which was nearing the edge of the city along with Chuck's. "Should we bail now?"

"One more run!" Chuck. "We didn't get good enough photos."

Seriously? Did they not hear about the briefing? And the hacker? "We have a hacker who probably already had more than we'd ever get out of pictures," Cipher answered. "You're just risking your own life for nothing!"

"Come on, man. Consider it as a challenge."

You have got to be kidding me. On one hand, we'd die if we stay here too long. On the other hand... It was a good challenge. It'd be interesting to see if we could make it out alive. And as a plus, it would make it believable for the Belkans, that we were the ones with picture and the one they should pursue. That way, the hacker would be safe. "Okay, I'd say one more run," I said. "But this is your call, Cipher."

There was pause. "Just one more," Cipher answered. "Or we'll come back in more pieces than when we left."

There was a happy shout over the radio, and I winced. There were times when I hated our radios. "Thanks, Galm!" It was Chuck. FIgures. "We owe you one."

I couldn't help but laugh. They definitely owe us one. We got here without the knowledge nor consent of the Base Commander. We would probably get our asses kicked the moment we got back to base, regardless of the state we got back in. "What're you waiting for, then? Go get those pictures."

"We'll watch for any incoming threats," Cipher assured. As if they needed any assuring. Rip and Chuck were probably the only people in Valais who could be as crazy as Cipher and I.

The Green Freaks wasted no time to head back into the center of Hoffnung. I watched them as they head to a seemingly old and abandoned building in the middle of a cleared complex. That was where the secret weapon was being built?

The clearing that surrounded the building was a bit too big for my liking. It was unlikely that anyone could get to the building to get the files and get out again without being seen.

How would the hackers be able to get the file?

"Chuck, Rip, there would be incoming bogeys from your nine o'clock." I snapped out of my thoughts and looked at the radar. Sure enough, there were three Belkan planes just like Cipher described. "We're heading over to intercept."

I grinned. "Let's get 'em!" I punched my afterburner so I could get there quicker than they could get to Chuck and Rip. So far so good. I bet that those planes could see us. They were turning towards us. "They see us, buddy."

I heard Cipher laugh. "I don't know why that's a problem."

"Well, it'd be even less of a problem after we got them." I readied my AMRAAMs and locked them onto the planes. "Fox Three! Fox Three!"

One of the missiles went straight into one of the planes, but the other one was easily evaded. Well, at least it was better than nothing.

I looked at Cipher. His plane was banked to the left, presumably to take the plane on the left. That left me to get the one on the right. Wonderful. I looked back at the target. It was a MiG-21. I knew my plane was more or less better than the Fishbed. I should win this. That is, if I didn't happen to choose the wrong target and got to tangle with an Ace. No matter how good your plane was against the opponent's, if you didn't know how to fly it and they knew how to fly theirs, you're as good as dead.

But I knew damn well how to fly this plane.

The other plane rolled and entered a dive. I tried my best to follow its moves, keeping an eye on him as I did so. He stopped the dive and entered a loop. I followed him. As I did, I noticed how he was slowing down. He was trying to make me overshoot, trying to turn me into an easy target. I smiled. _Not today._

I slowed down, more than he did. The G was starting to pull against me, but the move managed to make the plane turn a sharper angle than my opponent's, placing him dead in my sights.

I pressed the trigger. "Fox 2!"

The plane exploded in a ball of fire. "Nice move, Pixy!" Chuck said. I saw his plane appear by my wing. "We've got the pictures now."

"Great timing!" Cipher said. He sounded as if he was straining. I looked at him. He was still tangled with that plane from earlier. "There are a few more planes - I counted seven - heading our way. So if we can get out before they arrive, I'd very much appreciate that."

I watched as he flew. He didn't seem to be in too much trouble. Sure, the other plane was chasing him instead of the other way, but Cipher did a good job of keeping him from locking on. I kept watching. They twisted and turned around each other. It almost seemed like a dance. It was beautiful. Deadly, but beautiful.

Cipher breaked and barrel-rolled. The plane shot past him.

"Fox 2!"

Boom.

"Great, now come on!" I turned to head back to Valais. "The welcoming committee gonna get here any second now."

"Where should we go? I don't think we can outrun those seven planes. Fulcrums."

Dammit. I looked at the map. The best way to get to Valais would be to cut straight through the terrain, but there were a lot of SAMs and AA guns in the way. There's a good chance more than one of us would get shot down along the way. Not to mention, those air defenses would slow us down, at least enough for those planes to catch up to us.

I scanned over the map for a way out. It seemed like the only option was the mountains. "Head to the mountains," I said. "We can probably lose them there. That route is also free of air defenses. Just be careful not to crash into the snow."

"Well, then," Cipher said. "Lead the way, Pixy."

You don't have to tell me twice. "Roger that." I moved my plane in front of the formation, temporarily taking lead. I knew the mountains like the back of my hand. Back in the academy, I used to enjoy playing tag with Blackhawk in the area. We'd chase each other, making sure to not go over the mountains. The winner is the person to get a good lock first. Blackhawk was an ace during shooting drills, but I was the better flier. I could probably go through the mountains with my eyes closed.

Not that I'd actually do that, though. I might end up losing a wing. Or both of them.

"Are you sure about this, Pixy?" Chuck asked. He seemed doubtful, and I don't blame him. The space between mountains was barely wide enough for two planes to get through. And we were about to go through the entire thing full speed.

"I'm sure." I was. "If a one-armed guy can go through this and survive, so can you."

"One-armed guy?! What one-armed g-"

"Just make sure to go in a single file."

I blasted ahead of them. The mountains were no different than when I flew there last. I looked at the radar. Right behind me were the Green Freaks, with Cipher coming in last on our line. The seven planes from earlier seemed to notice my strategy. I saw them trying to go around the mountains to intercept us once we got to the other side.

Shit.

If they got through before we did, we were as good as dead. Sure, there were four of us and seven of them, which we could probably handle. Of course, with _probably_ being the operative word there.

"Guys," I said through the radio. "The Fulcrums are going around the mountains to try and intercept us."

"That's not good," Cipher said. "Do you think we'll make it before they do?"

"If we go full-speed, yes, we'll definitely make it." I looked back. The Green Freaks were still there, but they were quiet. Too quiet. "Rip? Chuck? What do you think?"

There was a sigh. "Full speed," Chuck said. "None of us are carrying any weapons beside guns."

What? "Are you kidding me?!"

"Look, our plane is an experimental plane," Rip explained. As if I didn't know that. Of course it was experimental! No one on base knew what planes they were using. "It was a secret project by the Emmerians. We... we were their test pilots." Oh. That explained how they got hold of a plane no one else knew about. "When the project was terminated, the planes were set to be destroyed. We... well, we 'rescued' some of them from turning into scrap metal."

"But what does it have to do with your plane being unarmed?"

"We had to be completely undetected for this mission. Which meant no missiles under our wings. That left only the bay in the fuselage. But that space was already taken by this big-ass camera."

You have got to be fucking kidding me. I grimaced. "Then what are you waiting for? Full speed!" Pushing my throttle to the limit, I swerved between the mountains. We were running out of time. The seven Fulcrums would win - no, _could_ , they haven't won yet.

"There'll be a chicane just ahead of us," I warned everyone. "Be careful."

"How do you know?" Cipher asked. "Did you study the whole terrain before we went here?"

I rolled my eyes, even though I knew full well that Cipher couldn't see me. Habit. "This is what my brother and I did for fun back when we were in the academy."

"For _fun_?!" Chuck sounded incredulous, and I couldn't blame him. I knew that if I had the time to look down, I'd be seeing carcasses of planes that had crashed here. This isn't exactly the kind of _fun_ everyone's used to. "How in the bloody hell did you manage to still be alive? Or is this your ghost and all of us owe our lives to someone haunting us?"

There was a groan over the radio. "You read too much horror, Chuck," Rip said. "As soon as I get back to our room, I'm burning your novels."

"DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE!" Chuck sounded so angry, I had to hold back from laughing out loud. "I swear I'm gonna paint your plane pink!"

Oh, like _that_ was going to make it any uglier. Sometimes I wondered why they bother with a stealth paint when they choose the most obnoxious color available. Even a kid with minus 9 glasses could probably see them from the ground. "Keep your head together, guys," I said instead. "We're almost there."

The chicane was already behind us. I knew that just a few more turns, and we were out. Five more turns.

I looked at the radar. The Fulcrums were a bit behind us.

Four.

They were going to have to go through half a mountain to get to us when we got through.

Three.

Two.

Shit. With the Green Freaks' freakish planes, would they still see us?

One.

No matter how far ahead we were?

"Punch it!" I yelled, clear skies ahead of us once more. "Get to the clouds!"

We raced our way upwards, heading for cover. I hoped that the Green Freaks hadn't been seen. And I really, really hoped that none of the Fulcrum pilots looked at their radars. While Rip and Chuck's planes were stealth, Cipher and mine were not. If we're lucky, we'd get high enough for their radars to have problem detecting us.

Hopefully.

We made our way to the clouds. I looked at the radar again, The Fulcrums were still flying around the mountains. They were at the edge of my radar. With luck, that meant we were also at the edge of theirs. Maybe with luck, they wouldn't look at the radar and spot us. Maybe we'd be lucky for once.

Maybe.


	16. in-between 2d

Needless to say, Commander Ovechkin scorched our ears by the time our feet touched solid ground.

"What the hell are you thinking?!" Uh-oh. "You think you're being a hero, huh? You almost busted the entire operation! You could've gotten all of you killed!"

I winced. I wasn't at the other end of the shouting; Cipher was. Being Galm 1 proved to have its disadvantages, I guess. Ovechkin probably immediately assumed that he was the one in charge.

But he didn't know it was my idea. "Sir," I said, somehow keeping myself from wincing as Ovechkin immediately glared at me. "It was my idea, and despite Cipher being the lead, I am the senior one here. It was my call, not his."

Ovechkin growled. I barely managed not to run away. That man was fucking _scary_. "You're known for bad ideas, Foulke. But Jackson is still the leader. He's still the one who decides to let you lead." He turned to look at Cipher again. "Maybe he doesn't deserve to be Galm 1."

 _Ouch_. "Then who would be Galm 1?" When he looked at me, I glared back at him. "Really? Me and my bad ideas?"

Ovechkin opened his mouth, but someone interrupted him. "With all due respect, sir." I turned to look at the intruder. Intruders? Chuck? Rip? "Galm Team managed to save our lives from what was clearly a suicide mission. Shouldn't they be commended for that?"

Ovechkin seethed. "I don't know how you do things in your country, but here, we punish disobedience instead of rewarding them!"

Rip literally went head-to-head with Ovechkin, refusing to back down. I had to admit, that guy had guts. "Well, for one, we never stab anyone who saved us. And two, what they did took guts. They saved us when they didn't have to. When they weren't supposed to. You could've lost two pilots today, but instead, you lost none."

"Don't forget," Chuck added. "You need all the pilot you can get in this war. You can't just ground one, or lose a few others because they resigned, can you?"

"We're mercenaries," Rip agreed, nodding along. "We can go wherever we want, whenever we like it, and the planes are coming with us."

Did he just _threaten_ Ovechkin? Our _base Commander_ , Alexander Ovechkin?

Let me tell you, he did not look happy about it. "I warn you, Galm," he said, turning to face Cipher and me. "You're lucky no one's hurt. Next time, you can kiss Valais goodbye. Dismissed."

You don't need to tell me twice.

_X_

"Cipher, Pixy!" I didn't have to turn around to know that the Halo Squadron had just entered the mess. Why did Rowdy have to be so cheerful? "What's this I hear about you going against orders and the Green Freaks owing you their asses?"

I turned and glared at him. "I have no idea what you're talking about. And stop gossiping about other people. Bad habit."

"Bad Rowdy," Cipher muttered beside me. He was slumped on the table much like I was, his head resting on top of folded arms.

Scarlet took a seat across from me, laughing. "Someone's grumpy."

"They have reason to be," Robin said. He had a paper bag in his hands, which I bet was filled with donuts, if the smell was any indication. "I heard Ovechkin got so mad, he almost kicked both of them out."

I saw Cipher shake his head. "Not both of us. Just me."

I rolled my eyes. "He did not say he's going to kick you out. He said, and I quote, that you don't deserve to be Galm 1."

Robin scoffed. "Bullshit. Sure, Ovechkin's got an ugly temper. But he's all bark and no bite. Give him a day tops. He'll be back to normal."

Cipher and I couldn't help but look at him incredulously. From what we'd seen, there was no way that Ovechkin was 'all bark and no bite'. We'd be lucky if we were still here by the time the sun came up.

"He's right, guys!" Rowdy said, seeming to read our minds. "Do you really think Lance and I would still be here if Ovechkin stayed true to half the things he said?"

Lance glared at Rowdy. "No need to drag me into this," he grumbled. He took a seat beside Cipher. "But he's right, guys. We got into trouble more times than we could count, and most of the time, Ovechkin let us go."

"Most of the time, yes," Scarlet said. "I still remember when he didn't, and Rowdy and Lance had to wake up at 3 every day for a full three weeks."

Robin grinned. "Ovechkin told them that they had to get him coffee from the shop at the nearest town and that it should be on his desk at 6 a.m. sharp or else."

I couldn't stop my jaw from hanging open even if I tried. "Really? What did they do?"

Lance scratched the back of his head. And were his cheeks actually red? "Rowdy and I may or may not have messed with some of the supplies in his office."

Ooohhh... This ought to be good. "And by that, what do you mean, exactly?"

I admit I felt a bit disappointed when the two of them refused to say anything after that. Thankfully, Robin didn't disappoint. Like most flight leaders, he had no shame about sharing the exploits of his squadmates. "They changed his vodka flasks with milk, injected the jelly beans in his desk drawers with hot sauce, and redecorated the entire office with toilet paper."

What. The. Fuck.

Were Rowdy and Lance crazy?

"Oh, and they also write on every single one of those toilet paper with _Happy 80th, Ovi!_ "

Cipher stared at Lance and Rowdy for a while. Both of them were beet red. Lance had his head in his hands, and Rowdy was intently studying the table, refusing to meet anyone's eye. "You lucky bastards," Cipher said. I looked at him. He was smiling; a good change from his sulk earlier. "My old base commander would've dropped you guys 100 miles out and tell you to get back within 36 hours."

Scarlet smiled. "Well, that doesn't sound too bad."

"What you didn't know is that Johanssen Air Force Base isn't that different from Valais," he explained. Johanssen Air Force Base... Cipher's old base? "All snowy mountains. And those guys woulda been dropped a few miles out the range."

"They would've had to hike all the way back, then," I said. An impressive feat. With it snowing there like it did in Valais, it'd be a miracle if those guys made it back without hypothermia and frostbite. And that was if they made it back at all. "Did they make it back?"

"Made it back with six hours to spare." Cipher was shaking his head. "I have no idea how Rights did it, but I think it was still unbeaten."

"Rights?" Rowdy laughed. "What kind of a name is that?"

"Dave Wright," Cipher explained. "He was the Captain in my squadron."

All of us froze. A Captain did something so bad that he got punished that bad? That man must've been a legend. "What did he do?" Robin was the one who asked. He seemed the most surprised out of us all, probably because he was a Captain himself.

Cipher went red. "I don't really know... but rumor has it that the Base Commander found him sleeping with said Commander's daughter..."

The whole table bursted into laughter. I couldn't believe it myself. Sleeping with- That man had some balls. And not enough brain cells to keep himself from getting busted. "Never mind Rights!" Rowdy laughed out. "Romeo would be a better nickname!"

"Mr. Suicide's more like it," Lance said. "He must've had no fear of death!"

"The Demon of Razgriz himself!"

"No, not that fairy tale again! You read too much of them, Pixy!"

"I do not!"

_X_

Neither of us bumped into Ovechkin the entire next day. The fact that there was no briefing had definitely helped. Also, we made sure to not go to Ovechkin's usual haunts. We even stayed clear from the table he preferred to eat in whenever we're in the mess.

I did, however, bump into someone on my way to my quarters. "Hey, Malkin," I greeted him. I realized that he looked grumpy. And a bit tired. There were dark bags under his eyes, as if he hadn't slept for days. "Is something wrong?"

Malkin nodded. "Big mission soon," he said. "Tiger and Halo are going on mission with Allied Forces."

Big mission, _indeed_. "That's great, buddy." I smiled. A joint mission with the Allied Forces? That's gotta mean something good. Maybe the war's turning in our favor. "So why the glum face?"

"Galm and Green Hornet aren't coming with us."

Wait, what? "Why?" I asked. It didn't make sense. Galm was paired with Halo, and Tiger was paired with the Green Fre- _Hornets_. Damn it. I keep forgetting that Green Freaks isn't their real name. "Aren't we supposed to go up together?"

"Ovechkin's got a different mission for you." I noticed that Malkin was staring at the floor now, his hands in his pockets. It definitely wasn't a good sign. The last time he looked like that was when Alpha Team was paired to a different squadron. "You're going to B7R."

"The Round Table?" I realized that I sounded a bit choked at the last word, but I didn't care. Cipher and I are going to the Round Table. B7R. If there was ever a contest on which airspace is the most difficult to fight in, B7R would probably win by a mile. Personally, I never fought in it, but from other pilots' stories, I knew it was bad. "Why are we going there?"

"I don't know," Malkin said, shaking his head. "Commander didn't give details. And only squad leaders know. About the mission, not why you go there."

Great. Maybe I could ask Robin about this. Provided that he knew more than Malkin did, of course. Damn, things sure went downhill fast. "Thanks for the heads up, Malkin," I said.

He nodded. "No problem." He turned around then, heading towards his own quarters. But before he got too far, I heard him shouting back. "Just be careful!"

Damn right I would.

_X_

 _"Larry!" I looked around. There was no one. "Larry!"_

 _A bright light._

 _I blinked._

 _I was in my Eagle. The skies were dark and tainted with red. There were angry clouds everywhere. I looked around. There was a plane, and I was by its wing. I recognized the silhouette; a Lockheed XF-90._

 _I only knew one person who flew the plane._

 _"Larry? Where are you? Where-"_

 _A missile came out of nowhere._

 _It hit the plane._

 _"No!"_

 _A flash of light._

 _I couldn't blink._

 _There was a silhouette. A person. Right in front of me._

 _"Why didn't you help?"_

 _Huh?_

 _"You're my wingman! You didn't protect my six! You left me!"_

 _"Left me for dead..."_

 _"Left me for dead..."_

 _"Left me for dead..."_

 ** _"PIXY!"_**

_X_

I sat up abruptly, trying to catch my breath. The room was dark, and my eyes hadn't adjusted yet. When it did, I realized that I was in my room. And Cipher was standing on the ladder attached to the bunk, his hand reaching out to shake my shoulder. "Finally," he said. He seemed relieved. "You were screaming, Pix. Bad dream?"

I winced. I was screaming? Sheesh. Talk about losing control. "More like bad nightmare." I rubbed a hand over my face, trying to wake myself up a bit more. "I wasn't loud enough to wake anyone, was I?"

Cipher smiled. "Just loud enough to wake me. You wanna talk about it?"

Truthfully, a part of me wanted to keep it a secret. It was my own business, after all. But deep down, I felt okay about sharing it with Cipher. He was my wingman after all. If you couldn't be open with your wingman, then who else? Obviously not family, since mine had either considered me dead or they were dead themselves.

"It's my old flight lead," I said. I looked at Cipher. If he had black hair and blue eyes instead of brown and brown, I would've mistaken him for Blackhawk. "He died on our first mission at Valais. We'd underestimated the Belkan fighters. We figured that, since we were Belkans ourselves, we'd be able to read all their tactics." I took a deep breath. "We were wrong."

I looked at the night sky through the small window in our shared room. It was cloudy, not unlike that night. There were no stars in sight; only the signs of an imminent storm.

"Most of our flight was destroyed. Including Blackhawk."

I felt Cipher tighten his grip on my shoulder. "I'm sorry, Pixy." He smiled again. "He must've been a great pilot."

I chuckled. "That he was." I looked at how Cipher was standing, holding onto the ladder all this time. It couldn't be comfortable. I patted the extra space of bed beside me, but he shook his head. "He was also a great brother."

I didn't miss the way Cipher frowned at that. I knew that it was pretty unusual for brothers to be in the same unit. It was usually forbidden. But then again, both of us were in Galm; a _mercenary_ unit. A lot of rules don't apply to us. "Both of you run away from Belka together?"

I nodded. "He got turned down from the Air Force. When he decided to be a mercenary, I followed him." I smiled. "He's my brother. I couldn't leave him hanging."

"Why did he get turned down? If he made it in the mercenary business, he can't be that bad."

I chuckled. "Kid, you gotta be better than most to be a good mercenary. Countries won't hire you if you're just as good as their own pilots. People like us, we gotta be good and willing to do dirty work."

I saw Cipher shrug. "I guess you're right." He looked down at the mattress, seemingly deep in thought. "Did you ever miss being in the Air Force?"

I thought about it. It wasn't that hard to answer. Belka's military was getting bad in the end anyways, but it didn't mean that I never thought about it at all. "Sometimes," I said at last. "Not a lot. But yeah. Nothing beats the pride of knowing that you're fighting for your own country."

Cipher nodded. I understood. It was probably what he was thinking most of the time.


End file.
